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Connections overview

Learn about connections in Actioner and how to connect your tools.

For a workflow to communicate with a tool, it has to be authorized to interact with it. This authorization is referred as a connection.

Actions in Actioner send data to perform tasks or to retrieve data for workflow components. Connections simply enable your actions to send API requests to your systems.

A connection works as a template for authentication in your tool. You can setup how Actioner sends API requests to your system by adding a connection and entering authentication credentials. Depending on the connection type, the credentials for authentication and authorization can be username/password, an API key or an OAuth2 access token.

Connections are reusable by all the workflows in your apps. This means that connections are not tied to a single action.

Note

Slack and HubSpot connections are also used for listening events in your Slack workspace and HubSpot accounts.

Connect your tools​

To add a new connection, go to My connections tab in your profile page and click + Add connection.

Add new connection from profile

Select connection type from below options and enter a name.

Actioner provides connections to authenticate with the most popular tools. If your tool is not in this list, you can setup a secure connection with Generic basic authentication or Generic API Key options.

Tip

We are actively working on extending our preset connections list. Give us a shout and join our community if you are looking for a connection with your tool.

Authenticate a connection​

Find the connection on Description tab of your app and click Connect. Enter your credentials on the opening screen.

Depending on the authentication type, you will be required to enter base URL, username, password, an API key or a shared access token. If the connection is done via OAuth2, you will need to give authorization to Actioner in your tool. Entering credentials for a connection

Supported authentication methods​

Actioner connects with your tools through Basic Authentication, API key and OAuth2.

Basic Authentication: is usually the most straightforward and easiest method for connecting to REST APIs by authenticating with a username and password. In a connection with Basic Authentication, Actioner places username:password into the request header every time the connection is called by an API request.

API key: is widely used for authenticating in various applications. In this method, a unique generated value is assigned to each first-time user, signifying that the user is known. Some tools take in API key parameter as sent in the query string, as the part of the URL, while some others accept the API key in the Authorization header. In a API key connection, Actioner sends the configured authentication parameters every time the connection is called by an API request.

OAuth2: is fundamentally considered as a much more secure and powerful authentication method in modern apps. It is used for identifying personal user accounts and granting proper permissions to Actioner. This method matches the login process of a user expects from most modern apps. Authentication of users typically is completed on the app’s own site, allowing you to easily connect accounts without directly entering your account credentials or looking up API keys.

Updating credentials of a connection​

Find the connection on My profile page, click ... ellipsis and select Reconnect. Enter your credentials on the opening screen.

Removing credentials from a connection​

You can unauthorize or delete the connection.

To unauthorize, find the connection on My profile page, click ... ellipsis and select Unauthorize.

To delete a connection, select Delete.

Sharing scope​

When Shared option is enabled for a connection, all API requests associated with that connection are sent with the credentials entered by a user in your Actioner workspace. If this option is disabled, each user enters their own credentials to execute actions and run workflows.

Shared connections do not mean that connection credentials are exposed to any user. Credentials are used to authenticate requests when the action using that connection is run. Let's say you added Create deal action to your workflow from HubSpot integration. The HubSpot connection uses a sales manager's credentials. When create deal step is run by sales reps, all deals will be shown as created by the sales manager even though the sales reps are creating deals.

Tip

To run an action added to a workflow, that action is required to be associated with a connection that has Shared option enabled.

Due to the nature of workflows, workflows run actions automatically. In this case, Actioner needs to know via which credentials to authenticate the action's requests.

Selecting a connection for an API request in an action​

Associating your requests with a connection is not mandatory in Actioner. You can proceed to sending requests by providing full URLs and setup authorization details such as API key or login credentials in your request's param, headers and body fields. However, sending requests with connections is highly recommended.

There are three important benefits of selecting a connection for your request:

  1. You can re-use the connection's base URL and authentication credentials for any request in your app. This saves you time with not having to enter the same URL or authentication parameters for each request.

  2. OAuth2 authentication: Actioner supports OAuth2 connection with GitHub, Jira, Zendesk, and other popular apps. It is not possible to configure OAuth2 by setting up a request. If you are connecting with GitHub, Jira, Zendesk or other apps we provide OAuth2 option, go to Connections page of your app and add a new connection.

    API Key authentication: To authenticate with an API key in your app, you need to provide a secret private API key in the HTTP headers or URL params. Setting up an API key in the request exposes the API key on request configuration -- meaning that the API key becomes visible to all users with app admin rights.

    Other HTTP authentications such as Basic or Bearer: Similar to API key, you need to provide your login credentials in the HTTP headers or URL params while configuring a Basic or Bearer authentication. This exposes your login credentials on request configuration. The credentials become visible to all app admins.

  3. Connections can be setup with selected sharing scopes. When Shared credentials option is disabled for a connection, each user will need to enter their username/password, API keys or access tokens to execute requests associated with that connection.

Multiple connections in the same app​

It is pretty common to design a set of workflows that works across multiple tools. Actioner is flexible in a way to let you add as much connection as you would like.

Connecting two instances of the same tool​

Under the same app, you can add multiple connections from the same tool. As a shortcut, you can clone your existing connection and just update the base URL if necessary and enter credentials to authenticate in the second instance.

Viewing all your connections​

You can see the list of your authenticated connections on Connections tab on My profile page.

Reconnect to enter your credentials again. Unauthorize to remove your credentials from a connection.

Authenticated connections list

Testing a connection​

You can test a connection once you enter credentials to authenticate. Test requests are sent to the configured test endpoints. For generic connections, you can specify a test URL.

To test a connection, find your connection on Connections tab on My profile page. Test by clicking Test connection button at top right corner.

Note

Make sure that base URL is not empty before testing a connection.

Changing the base URL of a connection​

Some apps require different base URLs depending on the data region, or server, or they might use subdomains. In case you want to setup a connection or update an existing one, you can change the base URL.

To update base URL of a connection, find your connection on My profile page and click on it. Connection detail page opens up. Find Base URL field and enter the new URL.

Connecting to Slack​

Visit connect to Slack page to learn how you can connect a Slack workspace.

"User not found" error in Slack​

This error means that your Slack user is not mapped with your Actioner user and is thrown when you are registered to Actioner and Slack with different emails.

Visit User mapping for Slack section to learn how you can map your user.