Technical Guide

Sending Messages

Messages are sent via MQTT Topics. By defualt, there are 4 topic types supported:

• Device

• Store

• Role

• Group

To post messages / notifications to a Topic, BlueFletch Enterprise supports two methods:

• BlueFletch Portal

• Rest API

BlueFletch Portal

By using the BlueFletch Portal, an Admin can send messages to a specific topic. Simply log into the Portal and navigate to the 'Enterprise Launcher' tab, then 'Notifications'.

Enter the desired topic and json object of the message, then press send. See Notification Body for the format of the JSON Object.

Rest API

Posting a JSON object to the 'Notify' endpoint will send messages to the Topic.

URL : https://ems-services-api.bluefletch.com/playbook/apiv1/api/notify

Method: POST

Parameters : topic a string representing the Topic to post the message.

Header : x-bf-pb-apikey the organization's API Key

Body : the JSON object representing the message to send. See Notification Body for the format of the JSON Object.

Example CURL

curl -X POST "https://ems-services-api.bluefletch.com/playbook/apiv1/api/notify?topic=associates"  
          -H "x-bf-pb-apikey: apikeyhere"  -H "accept: */*" 
          -H "Content-Type: application/json" 
          -d "{ \"notificationId\": 6001, 
                \"contentTitle\": \"Customer Phone Call\", 
                \"contentText\": \"Call Jenny\", 
                \"expandedTitle\": \"\",  
                \"expandedText\": [],  
                \"packageName\": \"com.android.dialer\",  
                \"intentAction\": \"android.intent.action.CALL\", 
                \"intentExtras\": [{ \"key\": \"DATA\", \"value\": \"tel:\/\/8675309\" } ], 
                \"autoCancel\": true, 
                \"onGoing\": false, 
                \"useSound\": true, 
                \"useHeadsUp\": false}"

Notification Body

Field	Description
notificationId	number indicates the Notification Id. Should be unique per notification. Can use the same Id to replace an existing message being displayed
contentTitle	string Title of the message to display
contentText	string Text of the Message body
expandedTitle	string Expanded Text of the Message body
expandedText	array Array of string to display in the expanded message
packageName	string Represents the package to invoke if the message display is press by the user
intentAction	string Represents the ACTION to invoke if the message display is pressed by the user
intentExtras	array Array of Intent Objects to insert within the intent posted when if the message display is pressed by the user
autoCancel	boolean true/false, allow the user to dismiss the message
onGoing	boolean true/false,
useSound	boolean true/false,
useHeadsUp	boolean true/false
soundName	string Optional parameter to specify a custom audio file on the device for notifications if useSound=true AND useHeadsUp=true. Example strings: If using local file path: "/sdcard/Download/ems/MyRingTone", where the file /sdcard/Download/ems/MyRingTone.mp3 exists on the device (note to not include the file extension in the field value). If using assets: "soundName": "assets:message_tone", where an asset exists in the launcher.json such as "message_tone": "https://example-file-hosting-site.com/MyRingTone.mp3".

Intent Object

Field	Description
key	string key of the Intent data
value	string value for the intent object

Example Notification Body

{
    "notificationId": 6001,
    "contentTitle": "Customer Phone Call",
    "contentText": "Call Jenny",
    "expandedTitle": "",
    "expandedText": [],
    "packageName": "com.android.dialer",
    "intentAction": "android.intent.action.CALL",
    "intentExtras": [
        {
            "key": "DATA",
            "value": "tel://8675309"
        }
    ],
    "autoCancel": true,
    "onGoing": false,
    "useSound": true,
    "useHeadsUp": false
}

Cancelling a Message

If desired to cancel a notification that has been sent, use the following notification format:

{
    "notificationId": 6001,
    "notificationAction": "cancel"
}

Using the notificationAction of "cancel", along with the notification Id of the sent message, will cause the messaging application to remove the message from the device notification tray.

Configuring the Messaging Client

Configuring the Messaging Client is only required if you are configuring another MQTT broker in addition to the BlueFletch MQTT broker cluster.

The Messaging application can be configured to connect to one or more MQTT brokers. The application configuration is declared in the BlueFletch Launcher configuration and the Launcher sends it to the Messaging application.

Messaging by default is configured to connect to the BlueFletch MQTT broker cluster in BlueFletch's Google Cloud Instance. To add a new broker for the Messaging application to connect to, create a new configuration in Launcher as follows:

Add the notifications array at the root level of the launcher.json file:

    "notifications" : [
        {
          "brokerId" : "myCustomBroker",
          "name" : "My Custom Broker",
          "url":  "ssl://<mqttBrokerHost:Port>",
          "urls": "",
          "randomizeUrls" : true,
          "enableOrganizationGroup" : true,
          "useEnhancedMessaging" : true,
          "muteNotificationsOnCall" : true,
          "notificationAcquireWakelocks" : true,
          "receiveOfflineMessages" : false,
          "mqttUserName" : "<mqttUserName>",
          "mqttPassword" :  "<mqttPassword>",
          "enableNotificationsAlwaysOn" : true,
          "enableHeadsUpNotifications" : true,
          "subscribeToIdentityGroups": false
        }

    ]

Field	Description
brokerId	string A free form string ID used by Messaging internally to differentiate brokers. Must not contain spaces.
name	string Friendly name for this broker connection. This will be displayed in the Messaging UI.
url	string The full URL (scheme, host and port) for the MQTT broker. Use this if connecting to one broker, or if you have a load balancer in front of your broker cluster. If there are multiple brokers, this key must still have a string value present, but define the broker list in the "urls" string. For secure MQTT, use the ssl:// scheme.
urls	string A comma delimited list of URLs corresponding to each server in an MQTT broker cluster. Messaging will select a broker URL for connection at random from the list (or will select in order if "randomizeUrls": false). If this key-value is used, "url" will be ignored but still requires a string value be present. Leave string empty to disable.
randomizeUrls	boolean Set to true to randomly pick the server to connect to among the "urls" list, otherwise Messaging will use the servers in the order listed. Default is true.
enableOrganizationGroup	boolean If set to true, Messaging will create a parent topic corresponding to your BFE Organization ID. This means that to the final topic string will be /<orgId>/topicName. Default is set to true.
useEnhancedMessaging	boolean If set to true, Messaging will create a broadcast intent internally in the device for other applications to receive the message payload directly.
muteNotificationsOnCall	boolean If set to true, Messaging will not make a notification sound if the device is currently on an audio call.
notificationAcquireWakelocks	boolean If set to true, Messaging will wake up the device when a message arrives.
receiveOfflineMessages	boolean (Deprecated) Must always be set to false.
mqttUserName	string The user ID for the MQTT connection.
mqttPassword	string The password for the MQTT connection.
enableNotificationsAlwaysOn	boolean If set to true, will automatically subscribe with the device serial number and site even when no user session is present.
enableHeadsUpNotifications	boolean (Deprecated) Must always be set to true.
subscribeToIdentityGroups	boolean If set to true, Messaging will subscribe to a topic for each identity group the user belongs to. Note that this may generate a lot of topics in your MQTT broker.
disableVolumeAdjustment	boolean If set to true, the device's volume will not be automatically adjusted to the maximum setting when a new message is received. Default is false. Introduced in Messaging version 3.5.1.