notification hub

Sending push notifications to your Xamarin app from WordPress with Azure, Part II – the Function

Sending push notifications to your Xamarin app from WordPress with Azure, Part II – the Function

First, let’s have a look at the lineup of this series once again:

  • Preparing your WordPress (blog/site)
  • Preparing the Azure Function and connect the Webhook (this post)
  • Preparing the Notification Hub
  • Send the notification to Android
  • Send the notification to iOS
  • Adding in Xamarin.Forms

Creating a new Azure Function in Visual Studio

The most simple approach to create a new Azure Function (if you already have an Azure account) is adding a new project to your Xamarin solution:

After the project is loaded, double click on the .csproj file in the Solution Explorer to open the file for editing it. Make sure you have the following two PropertyGroup entries:

  <PropertyGroup>
    <TargetFramework>net461</TargetFramework>
    <AzureFunctionsVersion>v1</AzureFunctionsVersion>
  </PropertyGroup>
  <ItemGroup>
    <!--DO NOT UPDATE THE AZURE PACKAGES, IT WILL BREAK EVERYTHING!!!!-->
    <PackageReference Include="Microsoft.Azure.NotificationHubs" Version="1.0.9" />
    <PackageReference Include="Microsoft.Azure.WebJobs.Extensions.NotificationHubs" Version="1.3.0" />
    <PackageReference Include="Microsoft.NET.Sdk.Functions" Version="1.0.31" />
    <PackageReference Include="Newtonsoft.Json" Version="9.0.1" />
  </ItemGroup>

You may notice that I made an all caps comment into the second PropertyGroup entry. As I am using a v1 Function, these are the latest packages that I am able to use. They are doing their job, and allow us to use an easy way to bind the Function to the Azure NotificationHub , which we are going to implement in the next post. I delayed updating the whole setup to use a v2 function intentionally at this point.

Processing the Webhook payload

In order to be able to process the payload (remember, we are getting a JSON string) from our WordPress Webhook, we need to deserialize it. Let’s create the class that holds all information about it:

using Newtonsoft.Json;

namespace NewPostHandler
{
    public class PublishedPostNotification
    {
        [JsonProperty("id")]
        [JsonConverter(typeof(StringToLongConverter))]
        public long Id { get; set; }

        [JsonProperty("title")]
        public string Title { get; set; }

        [JsonProperty("status")]
        public string Status { get; set; }

        [JsonProperty("featured_media")]
        public string FeaturedMedia { get; set; }
    }
}

The class gets it pretty straight forward, we will use this implementation as-is for the payload we are sending to Android later on. The use of the StringToLongConverter is optional. For completeness, here is the implementation:

using Newtonsoft.Json;
using System;

namespace NewPostHandler
{
    public class StringToLongConverter : JsonConverter
    {
        public override bool CanConvert(Type t) => t == typeof(long) || t == typeof(long?);

        public override object ReadJson(JsonReader reader, Type t, object existingValue, JsonSerializer serializer)
        {
            if (reader.TokenType == JsonToken.Null) return default(long);
            var value = serializer.Deserialize<string>(reader);
            if (long.TryParse(value, out var l))
            {
                return l;
            }

            return default(long);
        }

        public override void WriteJson(JsonWriter writer, object untypedValue, JsonSerializer serializer)
        {
            if (untypedValue == null)
            {
                serializer.Serialize(writer, null);
                return;
            }
            var value = (long)untypedValue;
            serializer.Serialize(writer, value.ToString());
            return;
        }

        public static readonly StringToLongConverter Instance = new StringToLongConverter();
    }
}

Now that we prepared our data transferring object, it is time to finally have a look at the processor code.

[FunctionName("HandleNewPostHook")]
public static async Task<HttpResponseMessage> Run([HttpTrigger(AuthorizationLevel.Function, "post", Route = null)]HttpRequestMessage req, TraceWriter log)
{
    _log = log;
    _log.Info("arrived at 'HandleNewPostHook' function trigger.");

    //ignoring any query parameters, only using POST body

    PublishedPostNotification result = null;

    try
    {
        _jsonSerializerSettings = new JsonSerializerSettings()
        {
            MetadataPropertyHandling = MetadataPropertyHandling.Ignore,
            DateParseHandling = DateParseHandling.None,
            Converters =
            {
                new IsoDateTimeConverter { DateTimeStyles = DateTimeStyles.AssumeUniversal },
                StringToLongConverter.Instance
            }
        };

        _jsonSerializer = JsonSerializer.Create(_jsonSerializerSettings);

        using (var stream = await req.Content.ReadAsStreamAsync())
        {
            using (var reader = new StreamReader(stream))
            {
                using (var jsonReader = new JsonTextReader(reader))
                {
                    result = _jsonSerializer.Deserialize<PublishedPostNotification>(jsonReader);
                }
            }
        }

        if (result == null)
        {
            _log.Error("There was an error processing the request (serialization result is NULL)");
            return req.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.BadRequest, "There was an error processing the post body");
        }

       //subject of the next post
      //await TriggerPushNotificationAsync(result);
    }
    catch (Exception ex)
    {
        _log.Error("There was an error processing the request", ex);
        return req.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.BadRequest, "There was an error processing the post body");
    }

    if (result.Id != default)
    {
        _log.Info($"initiated processing of published post with id {result.Id}");
        return req.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.OK, "Processing new published post...");
    }
    else
    {
        _log.Error("There was an error processing the request (cannot process result Id with default value)");
        return req.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.BadRequest, "There was an error processing (postId not valid)");
    }
}

Let’s go through the code. The first thing I want to know is if we ever enter the Function, so I log the entrance. The second step is setting up the JsonSerializer to deserialize the payload into the DTO class I created before.

There are several scenarios that I am handling and returning different responses. Ideally, we would run through and arrive at the TriggerPushNotificationAsync call, followed by a jump the ‘OK‘- response if the post id received from our Webhook is valid. During testing, however, I ran into other situations as well, where I return a ‘Bad Request‘ response with a hint that something went wrong.

The implementation of the TriggerPushNotificationAsync method is not shown in this post as it will be subject of the next post in this series.

Testing the code locally

One of the reasons I chose to start the Function in Visual Studio is its ability to debug it locally. If you don’t have the necessary tools installed, Visual Studio will prompt you to do so. After installing them, you’ll be able to follow along.

Once the service is running, we will be able to test our function. If you haven’t already heard about it, Postman will be the easiest tool for that. Copy the function url and paste it into the url field in Postman. Next, add a sample JSON payload to the body (settings: raw, JSON) and hit the ‘Send’ button:

If all goes well, Postman will give you a success response:

The Azure CLI will also write some output:

As you can see, all of our log entries were written to the CLI, plus some additional information from Azure itself. Don’t worry for the moment about the anonymous authorization state, this is just because we are running locally. In theory, we could already publish the function to Azure now. As we know that we will extend the Function in the next post, however, we will not do this right now.

Conclusion

As you can see, writing an Azure Function isn’t as complicated as it sounds. Visual Studio brings all the tools you need to get started pretty fast. The ability to test the Function code locally is another big advantage that comes with Visual Studio.

In the next post, we will configure the NotificationHub on Azure and extend our Function to call into it and fire the notifications.

Until the next post, happy coding, everyone!
Posted by msicc in Android, Azure, Dev Stories, iOS, Xamarin, 1 comment
Sending push notifications to your Xamarin app from WordPress with Azure, Part I [new series]

Sending push notifications to your Xamarin app from WordPress with Azure, Part I [new series]

Overview

Choosing the “right” solution for sending push notifications isn’t easy if you have a WordPress blog. There are quite a bunch of options to choose from, and the right one for you might differ from my decision. I am using the most generic solution – a Webhook that triggers an Azure Function, which triggers the notification via Azure Notification Hubs. This series will grow as follows:

  • Preparing your WordPress (blog/site) (this post)
  • Preparing the Azure Function and connect the Webhook
  • Preparing the Notification Hub
  • Send the notification to Android
  • Send the notification to iOS
  • Adding in Xamarin.Forms

The app implementations are very platform-specific, but it is quite easy to integrate the post notifications in a Xamarin.Forms app (which will be the last post in this series). If you want to see the whole integration already in action, feel free to download my blog reader app:

WordPress plugins for the win

If you have a self-hosted blog like I do, you may know that the plugin ecosystem is there to help you with a lot of things that WordPress hasn’t out of the box. While a WordPress-hosted site as Webhook integration without an additional plugin, we need one to create such a Webhook on a self-hosted WordPress blog. The plugin I am using is simply called “Notification” and can be found here.

To install the plugin, follow these simple steps:

  • choose “Plugins” on your WordPress dashboard
  • select “Add New” and type in “notification”
  • Hit the “Install Now” button
  • Activate the plugin

Exploring the options

Once you have installed and activated the plugin, you will have a new option in the dashboard menu. Let’s have a look at the options.

  • Notifications – this shows you a list of your currently active notifications
  • Add New Notification – lets you create a new notification
  • Extensions – the plugin allows you to extend your notifications with external services like Slack, Twitter or SendGrid to engage even more users. We do not need these for the webhook, however.
  • Settings – the control panel for the plugin – this is where we will be for the rest of this blog

Enabling the Webhook

On the Settings page, select the “CARRIERS” option. The plugin uses so-called carriers to send out the notifications. By default, the Email carrier is active. I do not need this one for the moment, so I deactivated it an activated the Webhook carrier instead:

Setting Post Triggers

The next step is to verify we have the trigger for posts active:

You can modify the other triggers as well, but for the moment, I am focusing just on posts. I am thinking about integrating comments in the future, which will allow even more interaction from within my app.

Add a new notification

Let’s create our first notification. Select the “Add New Notification” action, which will bring up this page:

Select the “Add New Carrier” option and add the Webhook carrier:

Next, select the Trigger for the Webhook. During development, I am using the saving draft option as it allows me to easily trigger a notification without annoying anyone:

This will enable the “Merge Tags” list on the right-hand side. To create the Webhook payload, we need to add some arguments (using the “Add argument” button). Tip: you can copy the merge tag by just clicking on it and paste it into the “Value” box:

Don’t forget to activate the JSON format – we do not want it to be sent as XML. Make sure the Carrier is enabled and hit the save button on the upper right.

Testing the Webhook

Now that we finished the setup of our Webhook, let’s test it. To do so, go to the “Settings” page again and select “DEBUGGING”. Check the “Enable Notification logging” box and click the “Save Changes” button:

To test the notification, just create a new blog post and save the draft. Go back to the “DEBUGGING” setting, where you will be presented a new Notification log entry. Expanding this log entry, you will see some common data about the notification:

If you scroll a bit further down, you will see the payload of the Webhook. Sadly, you won’t get the raw JSON string, but a structured overview of the payload:

Verify that the payload contains all the data you need and adjust the settings if necessary. Once that is done, we are ready to go to the next blog post (coming soon).

Conclusion

In this post, I showed you how to create a Webhook that will trigger our upcoming Azure Function. Thanks to the “Notification” plugin, the process is pretty straight forward. In the next post, we will have a look at the Azure Function that will handle the Webhook.

Until the next post, happy coding, everyone!

Posted by msicc in Android, Azure, Dev Stories, iOS, Xamarin, 1 comment
MSicc’s Blog version 1.6.0 out now for Android and iOS

MSicc’s Blog version 1.6.0 out now for Android and iOS

Here are the new features:

Push Notifications

With version 1.6.0 of the app, you can opt-in to receive push notifications once I publish a new blog post. I use an Azure Function (v1, for the ease of bindings – at least for now), and of course, an Azure NotificationHub. The Function gets called from a WebHook (via a plugin on WordPress), which triggers it to run (the next blog posts I write will be about how I achieved this, btw.)

New Design using Xamarin.Forms Shell

I also overhauled the design of the application. Initially, it was a MasterDetail app, but I never felt happy with that. Using Xamarin.Forms.Shell, I optimized the app to only show the last 30 posts I wrote. If you need older articles, you’ll be able to search for them within the app. The new design is a “v1” and will be constantly improved along with new features.

Bugs fixed in this release
  • fixed a bug where code snippets were not correctly displayed
  • fixed a bug where the app did not refresh posts after cleaning the cache
  • other minor fixes and improvements

I hope some of you will use the application and give me some feedback.

You can download the app using these links:
iOS | Android

Until the next post, happy coding, everyone!

Posted by msicc in Android, Azure, Dev Stories, iOS, Xamarin, 0 comments

Book review: Learning Windows Azure Mobile Services for Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 (Geoff Webber-Cross)

During the last months, I used the few times of my spare time when I wasn’t in the mood for programming to read Geoff’s latest book for diving deeper into Azure Mobile Services. Geoff is well known in the community for his Azure experience, and I absolutely recommend to follow him! I am really glad he asked me to review his book and need to apologize that it took so long to get this review up.

The book itself is very well structured with a true working XAML based game that utilizes both Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 and connects them to one single Mobile Service.

Even if you are completely new to Azure, you will quickly get things done as the whole book is full of step-by-step instructions. Let’s have a quick look on what you will learn while reading this book:

  1. Prepare your Azure account and set up your first Mobile Service
  2. Bring your Mobile Service to life and connect Visual Studio
  3. Securing user’s data
  4. Create your own API endpoints
  5. use Git via the console for remote development
  6. manage Push Notifications for both Windows and Windows Phone apps
  7. use the advantages of the Notification hub
  8. Best practices for app development – some very useful general guilty tips!

I already use a Mobile Service with my Windows Phone App TweeCoMinder. I have already started a Windows 8 version of that app, which basically only needs to be connected to my existing Azure Mobile Service to finish it.

Screenshot (359)

While reading Geoff’s book, I learned how I effectively can achieve this and also improve my code for handling the push notifications on both systems. The book is an absolutely worthy investment if you look into Azure and Mobile Services and has a lot of sample code that can be reused in your own application.

As this is my first book review ever, feel free to leave your feedback in the comments.

You can buy the book right here.

Happy coding, everyone!

Posted by msicc in Archive, 0 comments