Zendesk Native Unity SDK EAP (March 2020)

Zendesk is working to launch a native Unity SDK, an important step towards our mission of enabling the best in-app, personalized embedded customer experiences for mobile-focused businesses. This new SDK will allow your game development teams to integrate the complete Zendesk support capabilities natively into Unity 3D game. It is an easy drag-and-drop experience.

We're now about to release the first version of the Zendesk native Unity SDK. However, before we roll it out to General Availability, we're offering this Early Access Program to give some of our customers upfront access to the new SDK. The objective is to work closely with you to make improvements to the integration experience and get your feedback as we continue to build the core functionality.

All you have to do to join this EAP is fill in some information and you're ready to go! We'll review all responses and then select eligible partners for the program.

Zendesk Unity3D Plugin

The documentation below is for the Unity wrapper SDK, and not the EAP described above. Note that the EAP is written in C# and uses native Unity APIs.

This is a Unity plugin that wraps the iOS and Android Zendesk Support SDKs. Review the CHANGELOG for details about upgrading from previous versions.

This is an open source project, and is not directly supported by Zendesk. Check out the CONTRIBUTING page to find out how you can make changes or report issues.

Requirements

Unity 5.x

OS requirements

The Android build script, ./android-plugin/build.gradle, requires the zip command which is commonly distributed on Linux and Unix based systems, including Mac OS.

zip.exe is not distributed on Windows machines and must be installed and added to the PATH.

Alternatively, the 7zip command line application, 7za.exe, can be used to perform the same task. More details are in the stripCssFromAndroidSdk task in ./android-plugin/build.gradle.

iOS requirements

Xcode 9.0+
iOS 9 to 11
Android requirements also have to be met, even if only building the iOS plugin.

Android requirements

Most requirements will be downloaded automatically. You will have to ensure that some components are up to date in the Android SDK Manager.

Android API 15 (4.0.3) and above.
Android SDK Build-tools 24.0.0
Latest version of Android Support Repository

Basics

Import the Zendesk Unity SDK into your Unity project
- Import the sdk_unity_plugin project into Android Studio.
- Build the plugin with ./gradlew build
- Copy the output of build/unity-plugin/ into your Unity app.
You may see some errors like this: Could not create texture from Assets/Plugins/iOS/ZendeskSDK.bundle/{name}.png: File could not be read. These are safe to ignore and will disappear when you build the project for iOS. You also may need to ensure that the MessageUI, Security and MobileCoreServices frameworks have been added to the project that Unity exports to Xcode. These frameworks can be added by selecting the correct target in Xcode and then selecting the aforementioned frameworks in the Linked Frameworks and Libraries under the General tab.
Viewing the samples
- Copy the scripts from sample and attach either one to a GameObject in your scene.
- Select a GameObject (MainCamera for example) from the Hierarchy window
- On the Inspector window, push the 'Add Component' button
- Select one of the sample scripts you copied.

Creating your own class that uses Zendesk

To use the Zendesk SDK in Unity, you must create a class that extends MonoBehaviour and attach it to a GameObject in your scene.
Include the following two methods in your class:

// initialize Zendesk and set an identity. See ZendeskExample.cs for more information
void Awake() {
    ZendeskSDK.ZDKConfig.Initialize (gameObject, "https://{subdomain}.zendesk.com", "{applicationId}", "{oauthClientId}"); // DontDestroyOnLoad automatically called on your supplied gameObject
    ZendeskSDK.ZDKConfig.AuthenticateAnonymousIdentity();
}

// must include this method for any zendesk callbacks to work
void OnZendeskCallback(string results) {
    ZendeskSDK.ZDKConfig.CallbackResponse (results);
}

Android manifest
- [MUST DO] One of the <provider> elements must be uncommented for the plugin to build correctly. See the documentation in /Assets/Plugins/Android/AndroidManifest.xml
- You may already have a file at /Assets/Plugins/Android/AndroidManifest.xml. If so, you will have to manually merge the items of that manifest with the one we supply in our plugin. Specifically, your <application> tag must have the android:theme="@style/UnityTheme" attribute, and your UnityPlayerActivity (or derived class) <activity> entry must have <meta-data android:name="unityplayer.ForwardNativeEventsToDalvik" android:value="true" /> as a child tag.

App Configuration and Zendesk App Interfaces

Example C#:

c#
ZendeskSDK.ZDKHelpCenter.ShowHelpCenter();
ZendeskSDK.ZDKHelpCenter.ShowHelpCenter(options);

ZendeskSDK.ZDKRequests.ShowRequestCreation
ZendeskSDK.ZDKRequests.ShowRequestCreationWithConfig(config)

ZendeskSDK.ZDKRMA.Show();
ZendeskSDK.ZDKRMA.ShowAlways();

App configuration and the Zendesk App Help Center, Requests, and Rate My App interfaces can be found in the /Assets/Zendesk folder and are named:

ZDKConfig.cs
ZDKHelpCenter.cs
ZDKRequests.cs
ZDKRMA.cs
ZDKPush.cs
ZDKLogger.cs

Zendesk Data Providers

The Zendesk SDK provider interfaces can be found in the /Assets/Zendesk folder and are named:

ZDKAvatarProvider.cs
ZDKHelpCenterProvider.cs
ZDKRequestProvider.cs
ZDKSettingsProvider.cs
ZDKUploadProvider.cs
ZDKUserProvider.cs

Example C#:

c#
ZendeskSDK.ZDKRequestProvider.GetAllRequests((results, error) => {
    if (error != null) {
        Debug.Log("ERROR: ZDKRequestProvider.GetAllRequests - " + error.Description);
    }
    else {
        Debug.Log("GetAllRequests returned results");
        foreach(Hashtable request in results) {
            Debug.Log(String.Format("RequestId: {0}", request["requestId"]));
        }
    }
});

Push notifications

Enabling and disabling push notifications for the current user is pretty straightforward.

c#
if (!pushEnabled) {
    ZendeskSDK.ZDKPush.EnableWithIdentifier("{device-or-channel-identifier}", (result, error) => {
        if (error != null) {
            Debug.Log("ERROR: ZDKPush.Enable - " + error.Description);
        }
        else {
            pushEnabled = true;
            Debug.Log("ZDKPush.Enable Successful Callback - " + MakeResultString(result));
        }
    });
} else {
    ZendeskSDK.ZDKPush.Disable("device-or-channel-identifier", (result, error) => {
        if (error != null) {
            Debug.Log("ERROR: ZDKPush.Disable - " + error.Description);
        }
        else {
            pushEnabled = false;
            Debug.Log("ZDKPush.Disable Successful Callback - " + MakeResultString(result));
        }
    });
}

There is an example of this in the ZendeskTester.cs script file.

Notifications are a complex, OS-dependent feature. We provide the interfaces for enabling and disabling push. To handle incoming push messages you will need to configure the Urban Airship Unity SDK or the GCM / APNS SDKs.

Request Updates API

In version 1.10.0.1 of the Support SDK, the Request Updates API was added to allow querying for updates on requests without having to start the UI. Please note that the API is disabled when push notifications are enabled. Push integration should remove the need to query for request updates.

See ZDKRequestProvider.cs for the Request Updates methods: GetUpdatesForDevice and MarkRequestAsRead.

Interface customization

iOS

Zendesk application customization can be specified with IOSAppearance. ZenColor supports rgb and rbga values.

Example C#:

IOSAppearance appearance = new IOSAppearance ();
appearance.StartWithBaseTheme ();

appearance.SetPrimaryTextColor(new ZenColor (1.0f, 1.0f, 0f));
appearance.SetSecondaryTextColor (new ZenColor (1.0f, 0f, 0f));
appearance.SetPrimaryBackgroundColor(new ZenColor(0f, 0f, 1.0f));
appearance.SetSecondaryBackgroundColor (new ZenColor (0f, 1f, 0f));
appearance.SetMetaTextColor (new ZenColor (0.5f, 0f, 0f));
appearance.SetEmptyBackgroundColor (new ZenColor (0.5f, 0.5f, 0f));
appearance.SetSeparatorColor (new ZenColor (0.5f, 0f, 0.5f));
appearance.SetInputFieldColor (new ZenColor(0.5f, 0.7f, 0.2f));
appearance.SetInputFieldBackgroundColor(new ZenColor(0.9f, 0.1f, 0.9f));

appearance.ApplyTheme ();

Android

Zendesk application customization must be specified before the Android Unity plugin is created with ./gradlew build.

Include your style changes in:

/sdk_unity_plugin/android-plugin/src/main/res/values/styles.xml

The default styles.xml defines a theme called UnityTheme. This is then referenced by the AndroidManifest.xml file in your Unity project at /Assets/Plugins/Android.

To find defined styles and examples, see:

https://developer.zendesk.com/embeddables/docs/android/customize_the_look

Help Center Appearance Customization

Custom Help Center articles are styled with CSS that can be specified in the following files.

iOS

/Assets/Plugins/iOS/ZendeskSDK.bundle/help_center_article_style.css

Android

On Android, this file must be edited before you create the plugin with ./gradlew build

/sdk_unity_plugin/android-plugin/src/main/assets/help_center_article_style.css

String and Localization Customization

Custom strings and localizations can be specified in the following files. To change the default strings in your application, add replacements to the string you wish to modify. Make sure to include placeholders in the replacement of any strings that contain them.

iOS

Strings are specified in plist files, one for each Locale. Each locale is a separate [Locale] folder.

/Assets/Plugins/iOS/ZendeskSDKStrings.bundle/[Locale].lproj/Localizable.strings

To find list of strings, see:

https://developer.zendesk.com/embeddables/docs/ios/localize_text

Android

Strings are specified in xml files, one for each Locale. Each locale is a separate [Locale] folder. On Android, these files must be edited before you create the plugin with ./gradlew build

/Assets/Plugins/Android/zendesk-lib/res/values-[Locale]/strings.xml

To find list of strings, see:

https://developer.zendesk.com/embeddables/docs/android/localize_text

Known issues

When creating a ticket using Rate My App on Android, the description of the issue is used for the subject line of the ticket.
On request creation on Android, rotating the screen during sending appears to cancel the ticket. The progress dialog will disappear and the ticket form will regain focus. However, the ticket will still be successfully created, and will be present in the user's ticket list, though it will be missing any attachments added before the rotation.
Unity 3D fails to detect the Android SDK correctly when Android SDK Tools 25.3.1 is installed. Tracked on code.google.com.
The SDK can crash when deployed onto Android 4.0.3 devices. This occurs when your application is built with the Internal (default) build system. Building with gradle will fix this issue.

zengofran/sdk_unity_plugin

Zendesk Native Unity SDK EAP (March 2020)

Zendesk Unity3D Plugin

Requirements

OS requirements

iOS requirements

Android requirements

Basics

App Configuration and Zendesk App Interfaces

Zendesk Data Providers

Push notifications

Request Updates API

Interface customization

iOS

Android

Help Center Appearance Customization

iOS

Android

String and Localization Customization

iOS

Android

Known issues