Overview

The goal of this lab is to demonstrate how you can use AppSheet automation to send push notifications from an AppSheet app.

Objectives

In this lab, you learn how to perform the following tasks:

• Create an automation task in AppSheet to send a push notification.

• Use template variables to customize the body of the notification message.

• Create an event, process, and bot to send the push notification.

• Verify the receipt of the notification on a mobile device.

Setup

Before you click the Start Lab button

Read these instructions. Labs are timed and you cannot pause them. The timer, which starts when you click Start Lab, shows how long lab resources will be made available to you.

This hands-on lab lets you do the lab activities in a real cloud environment, not in a simulation or demo environment. It gives you new, temporary credentials to sign in and access AppSheet for the duration of the lab.

What you need

To complete this lab, you need:

• Access to a standard internet browser (Chrome browser recommended).

• Time to complete the lab.

1. Make sure you sign in to the lab using an incognito window.

2. When ready, click .

   A new panel will appear with the temporary credentials that you must use for this lab.

   If you need to pay for the lab, a pop-up will open for you to select your payment method.

3. Note your lab credentials. You will use them to sign in to AppSheet for this lab.

   If you use other credentials, you will get errors or incur charges.

4. Click Open AppSheet to open the AppSheet UI in a separate browser tab or incognito window.

   Note: If you are not already using an incognito browser window, use the right mouse click in Chrome to open AppSheet and select Open link in incognito window.

5. Click to sign in with Google.

   

6. In the Sign in with Google dialog, enter the provided Username, and click Next.

   Note: If you see other accounts listed, click Use another account and then enter the provided Username and click Next.If you use other credentials, you'll get errors or incur charges.

7. Enter the provided Password and click Next.

8. Click Accept to accept the terms.

9. To enable AppSheet to access the Google Drive folders associated with your lab account, on the AppSheet consent page, click Allow.

   

10. You're now signed in to AppSheet.

    To view the AppSheet MyApps page, click X in the top-right corner of the Tell us about you so we can make better recommendations dialog.

    The MyApps page might be empty since you do not have any apps yet.

Task 1. Create the app

When working on your own app, you normally would incrementally build the app over a continuous project timeline.

Apps that you build are saved and accessible in the Recent section on the Apps page until they are deployed and published.

In this task, you create the app that was built in a previous lab, using a template.

Delete prototype app (if listed)

In the lab environment, the app built in a previous lab might still be listed in the Recent section. You cannot use this app to continue working on this lab because the underlying data is not available for use by the app.

The app must first be deleted before you continue with this lab.

1. If the Employee Onboarding app is listed, on the 3-dots menu, click Delete.

2. To confirm the deletion, click Delete.

   

Copy a template app to your AppSheet account

To continue building the Employee Onboarding app in this lab, you must first recreate the app from a template.

1. To copy the Employee Onboarding app to your AppSheet account, click the link: Employee Onboarding

2. In the app preview, click Accept.

3. In the left navigation menu, click Copy app ().

4. In the Copy app form, for App name, type Employee Onboarding, and leave the remaining settings as their defaults.

5. Click Copy app.

   AppSheet creates the app and copies the Google sheet that is used by the app to the /appsheet/data/Employee Onboarding-nnnnnnn folder under the My Drive folder on Google Drive.

   AppSheet creates a folder for each of your apps with your account ID (represented by nnnnnnn) in the data folder.

6. To go to the AppSheet editor, click Customize your app.

   You can also access the app from the Apps page in the AppSheet UI under Owned by me.

Your app is set up with the original employee data, and you can now continue to build out the app's functionality.

Click Check my progress to verify the objective. Create the app.

Task 2. Create a push notification task

In this task, you create an automation task in AppSheet to send a push notification whenever an app user modifies the hire date of an employee in the app.

1. In the AppSheet UI, in the left navigation bar, click Automation () > Tasks.

2. To create a task, click Create a new Task (+).

3. In the new task form, specify the following, and leave the remaining settings as their defaults:

   Property	Value (type or select)
   Task category	Send a notification
   Task name	Hire date change push notification
   Table name	Employee

4. To send the notification to a list of users, for To, click Add.

5. For the email address, enter your own email address that you have access to.

   Note: If you enter an email address that contains special characters such as hyphen or plus, you must enclose the email address in quotes, for example "test-email@gmail.com".

6. To customize the title and body of the notification, disable Use default content.

7. In the Notification Content section:

   a. For Title, type Employee hire date change

   b. For Body, type:

   Employee ID: <<[ID]>> Employee Name: <<[Name]>> Previous hire date: <<[_THISROW_BEFORE].[Hire date]>> New hire date: <<[_THISROW_AFTER].[Hire date]>> Note: The notification body uses template variables that must include the angle (<<, >>) brackets.

   When the task is executed, AppSheet automatically substitutes the column variables enclosed in square ([,]) brackets with their stored values. The values are taken from the columns of the current row in the Employee table that is configured for this task.

   The _THISROW_BEFORE and _THISROW_AFTER variables are used for the Hire date column to include its value before and after an Employee row is updated in the app.

8. To save your changes, click Save.

Task 3. Create the process, event, and bot

In this task, you create a process with a step that will execute the push notification task that was created earlier. You also create an event and a bot that executes the process.

Create a process to execute the push notification task

1. In the AppSheet UI, in the left navigation bar, click Automation () > Processes.

2. To create a process, click Create a new Process (+).

3. For the New Process, click More () and Rename to Notify hire date change.

4. For Table, select Employee. This process uses the Employee table.

5. To add a step to the process, click Add a step.

6. For Step name, type Send hire date change notification, and press ENTER.

7. For the type of step, select Run a task, and then select the Hire date change push notification task that was created earlier.

8. Click Save.

Create an event

With the process and task created, you now configure an event that triggers a bot that will run the process. In this task, you create and configure the event.

1. In the AppSheet UI, in the left navigation bar, click Automation () > Events.

2. Click Create a new Event (+).

3. For the New Event, click More () and Rename to Hire date change.

4. For Event Type, select Data Change.

   Events can be triggered on a fixed schedule or based on a change in data in the app's tables.

5. Click Updates only.
   This event will be triggered when a table row is updated in the app.

6. For Table, select Employee.

7. For Condition, click Filter (). In the Expression Assistant:

   a. For Condition for event Hire date change (Yes/No), type:

   [_THISROW_BEFORE].[Hire date] <> [_THISROW_AFTER].[Hire date]

   b. Click Save.

8. Leave the remaining settings as their defaults, and click Save to save your changes to the app.

Create the automation bot

Finally, you create the automation bot that is triggered by the event. When the event occurs, the bot runs the process that it's configured with.

Create the bot

1. In the AppSheet UI, in the left navigation bar, click Automation () > Bots, and click Create a new Bot (+).

2. Click Create a new bot.

3. For the New Bot, click More () and Rename to Notify change in hire date.

4. In the bot definition, click Configure event.

5. Select the Hire date change event that you created in the previous task.

6. For Run this process, click the arrow to display a list of processes, and select the Notify hire date change process that you created earlier.

7. Click Save.

Task 4. Test the automation

In this task, you test the automation by updating the hire date of an employee in the app.

Deploy the app

AppSheet will send notifications from automation tasks only to the app creator while the app is in prototype state. For other users to receive notifications, the app must pass a deployment check and be deployed.

1. To run a deployment check, in the AppSheet UI, navigate to Manage () > Deploy, and then click Deployment Check.

2. Click Run deployment check.

3. There should not be any errors displayed for your app. Ignore the warnings, and click Move app to deployed state.

Share the app

To receive a push notification from AppSheet, the recipient must be an authenticated user who has signed in to at least one AppSheet app with the email address specified in the To property that is configured in the push notification task. The application that the user signed in to need not be the application sending the notification.

In this task, you first share the app with your user email address before installing the app on your mobile device.

1. To share the app with yourself as the app user, in the title bar of the AppSheet UI, click Share .

2. For Email address or domain, type the email address that was used in the To property of the push notification task, and press ENTER.

3. Select the reCAPTCHA checkbox to verify that you are not a robot.

   Note: The reCAPTCHA verification has an expiry time, so you may have to select it again if it times out.

4. Click Send.

5. Click Done.

Install the app on your mobile device

AppSheet uses Notification Device Tokens to convert each email address in the To property of the push notification task into Device Tokens for the user's mobile devices. If the user has more than one device, the notification is sent to each device that the user has signed in from.

In this task, to verify receipt of the push notification, you install the Employee Onboarding app on your mobile device and sign in to the app.

1. On your device, open the email that you received in the previous task.

2. Click Install Employee Onboarding in the email.

3. Click Install.

4. If you do not already have the AppSheet app installed on your device, you're prompted to install it first.

   The AppSheet app is a hosting app that hosts the apps that you build.

   When you install and run your app on your device, it will appear to run on its own, but it is actually "hosted" by the AppSheet Hosting app.

5. Click Install to install the AppSheet app from your device's app store.

   Note: After the AppSheet app is installed on your device, do not open the app.

6. Return to your email and click Install Employee Onboarding in the email again.

7. To install the Employee Onboarding app, click Install.

8. If prompted, add the app to the home screen.

9. If required, click Accept to accept the user agreement.

   The app is now installed on your device.

10. Sign in to the app with your cloud provider, using your account credentials.

To send the push notification, trigger the bot

1. In the app running on your mobile device, in the navigation bar, click Employee.

2. To update the hire date of Employee 3, click Employee 3, and then click Edit ().

3. In the employee form, change the hire date of the employee to a future date.

4. Click Save.

5. Wait a few seconds for the app to automatically sync the update to the backend, or to sync the data changes manually, click Sync ().

6. Verify that a push notification was received from AppSheet on your mobile device.

7. Verify that the title and content of the notification matches that as configured in the push notification task.

Click Check my progress to verify the objective. Received a push notification.

Congratulations!

You've successfully configured your app to send push notifications using AppSheet automation.

In this lab you learned how to:

• Create an automation task in AppSheet to send a push notification.
• Use template variables to customize the body of the notification message.
• Create an event, process, and bot to send the push notification.
• Verify the receipt of the notification on a mobile device.

End your lab

When you have completed your lab, click End Lab. Qwiklabs removes the resources you’ve used and cleans the account for you.

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