Sometimes you will need to collect information from people who are not Onit users. In this event, Onit allows you to send an anonymous portal launch link via email to collect data and create a Record. The anonymous portal launch link allows users to fill in information without logging into Onit. When creating such a link, you can also pre-populate certain fields.
In this tutorial we will be creating an anonymous portal launch link to collect information about a company lunch (which is held once a month). We want our lunch guests to specify their name, if they will be attending, and if they have any food restrictions. We have created a stand-alone App (named Company Lunch) to collect the responses.
Create Action
To generate an anonymous portal launch page link, we will first create a new Send Notification Action. This Action will send an email that contains the HTML link.
- Navigate to the Actions node in your App.
- Create a new Send Notification Action named Anon Portal Launch.
- The Body property is where you will compose your message and build your anonymous portal launch link. To build the link you’ll use Liquid similar to the following:
{% create_launch_url link_url %}{% app 'Company Lunch' %}{% param month = now | date: "%B" %}{% param event_name = 'Monthly Roadrunner Watch Picnic' %}{% endcreate_launch_url %}{{ link_url }}
There are a few important parts of this Liquid to review:
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The Liquid must begin with the control flow statement
{% create_launch_url variable_name %}.Varaiable_namewill be the variable name for your portal launch URL. The{{ variable_name }}at the end of the Liquid statement will evaluate to the portal launch link displayed to the recipient. -
The next Liquid value must be
{% app 'App Name' %}with App Name being the exact case sensitive name of your App. The parameter block (i.e., all defined parameters) will follow your App name declaration.
Remember that, in all situations, records cannot be created in any App unless a name, requester_name, and requester_email Field value is defined. In the example above, none of these fields are pre-populated that’s because these Fields have default values defined in the App’s wizard. If that’s not the case for your App, be sure to pre-populate those fields using the example Liquid expression shown above.
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You can set any type of Field within the parameter block, including hidden and read-only Fields. In the example above we are pre-populating the
monthandevent_namefields.
Test It
Test to make sure that your Anon Portal Launch Action is working by sending the anonymous portal launch link to a test email. For this tutorial we have set up a Generate Launch Page Button to fire our Anon Portal Launch Action.
To review how to create an Action button see this tutorial.
- Click the Generate Launch Page Button on a Record to send the email.
- An email similar to the one below with the generated link will be sent to the specified recipient.
- Once the user clicks the link, they will be able to fill in the anonymous portal launch form. In addition, the month and event_name fields should be prepopulated upon page load.
When clicking the anonymous link in the email, your default browser should launch to the appropriate URL. To adequately test your Action, you’ll want to make sure that you’re logged out of the Onit environment in question before clicking the link. This will ensure that you are able to see, populate, and submit the form all without ever logging into Onit.
- Upon successful completion of the form, the user will see a thank you message and be prompted to close the window.
- Back in Onit, you should see a new Record in your App.
