Passing request parameters from HipChat action to sidebar

[Rob Laveaux]

I'm developing an add-on that uses a message action. The action opens a sidebar view.

How can I send the ID of the message as a request parameter to the sidebar view?

I need to know which message the user clicked, so that I can fill the sidebar with data related to this message.

[rich]

Here's how it works. First, you register your message action in your descriptor:

...
    "action": [
        {
          "key": "my.message.action",
          "name": {
            "value": "Send this to the sidebar"
          },
          "target": "my.sidebar",
          "location": "hipchat.message.action"
        }
      ]
...

Take note of the action's key (my.message.action). That's the event you need to subscribe to in your JS:

HipChat.register({
  "my.message.action": function(message) {
    console.log(message)
  }
});

That's it!

Now, when you click on the "Send this to the sidebar" action on a message, you should get something like this in your console:

{
  "body": "This is a test",
  "sender": {
    "id": 51380,
    "name": "Rich Manalang",
    "mention": "rich"
  },
  "mid": "a4444933-56ca-4fb8-8f1c-319635835617",
  "type": "message",
  "metadata": {}
}

Cheers!

[Steffen Opel _Utoolity_]

Pages loaded in HipChat dialogs or the sidebar can facilitate the Javascript API - in particular, you might want to look into Working with Sidebar Views, which illustrates how to pass parameters to the sidebar view and and receive them fin the sidebar iframe in turn.

[Rob Laveaux]

Hi Steffen, thank you for your answer. I have already read this part of the documentation, but can't get it to work. I'm calling AP.register from the sidebar during $(document).ready(), using the action key in the parameters. But the callback function is not triggered.

Where and when does AP.register need to be called?

Secondly is it possible to call a JavaScript function when a message action gets clicked? This way I could use HipChat.sidebar.openView and pass the required request parameters.

Please provide examples if you can, because the documentation lacks some important details to get things working.

[Steffen Opel _Utoolity_]

@Rob Laveaux - it's been a while since I last worked with those APIs myself in a PoC, so I'm unable to provide more detailed guidance myself right now. That being said, if you are looking for specific examples, I recommend checking out the well maintained HipChat Connect Tester sources, which should at least provide more insight/guidance on how those APIs are supposed to be used, or by chance even provide the exact code you are looking for - good luck!

[Rob Laveaux]

Thank you, I found my mistake. I was calling AP.register multiple times to register different handlers. This overwrites the handlers on each call.

Instead I need to call AP.register once with an array of handlers. Like this:

AP.register({
      "message.send.to.addon": showMessage,
      "receive-parameters": showMessage
});

[Fernando Boucquez (PPL)]

In addition to Rob's comments, It looks like HipChat.register and Ap.register overwrite each other so second call may unregister first even listeners.