Form APIs
The Forms API is ideal for people who want to get data into Accelo from "Forms" that people submit from websites, intranets and other web-based environments. The Forms API has the advantage of being simpler to use than the full RESTful API - you simply create a <form> in your web page, populate it with tags (eg, <input type="text" name="company_name"/>) that the user submits and when you point the form's POST Action at your Accelo domain, we'll take your data, provide some light validation, and then save the data to your account in real time.
Security & Access Control
When you're putting a Form on the public internet, it is important to realize that in addition to people filling it out, you've also got to contend with spammers. To help keep your Accelo account clean of spam, we recommend using reCAPTCHA or, if you want to live a bit more dangerously, using a JavaScript/AJAX call to process form data.
APIs
The Accelo Forms API provides a number of different endpoints or versions that allow you to push different types of Form information into your Accelo account.
Company
The Company Forms API creates a client company, contact and affiliation (link) straight into your Accelo account. You can also optionally create activities (emails) to individuals or groups or users, and even upload files (attachments). This endpoint also supports custom fields and categories.
For more information on the fields we support and how to use this API, visit our Company Forms API documentation page.
Contact
The Contact Forms API creates a contact (without a company), optionally create activities (emails) to individuals or groups or users, and even lets you upload files (attachments). This endpoint also supports custom fields and categories.
For more information on the fields we support and how to use this API, visit our Contact Forms API documentation page.
Request
The Request Forms API creates a request in the request queue of your choice, along with the client, contact and affiliation (link) and optionally even upload files (attachments). This endpoint also supports custom fields and categories (for the company/contact objects; requests do not have custom fields at this time).
For more information on the fields we support and how to use this API, visit our Request Forms API documentation page.
Sale
The Sales (or Prospect) Forms API creates a sale (aka a prospect) of a specific type and at a specific status. In addition to creating the company and contact (or finding and using existing records if they're already in Accelo), you can also specify the values for the sale (due dates, star rating, salesperson assigned), set custom fields, upload files and send emails/activities to individuals or groups of users.
For more information on the fields we support and how to use this API, visit our Sale Forms API documentation page.
Project
The Project (or Job) Forms API creates a project (aka a job) of a specific type and at a specific status. In addition to creating the company and contact (or finding and using existing records if they're already in Accelo), you can also specify the values for the project (description, manager, fixed-budget), the template to use, specific custom milestones to add, budget information and to set custom fields, upload files and send emails/activities to individuals or groups of users.
For more information on the fields we support and how to use this API, visit our Project Forms API documentation page.
Ticket
The Ticket (or Issue) Forms API creates a ticket (aka an issue) of a specific type and at a specific status. In addition to creating the company and contact (or finding and using existing records if they're already in Accelo), you can also specify the values for the ticket (classification, priority, due date, who the ticket is assigned to, etc), set custom fields, upload files and send emails/activities to individuals or groups of users.
For more information on the fields we support and how to use this API, visit our Ticket Forms API documentation page.
Retainer
The Retainer (or Contract) Forms API creates a new retainer/contract of a specific type and at a specific status. In addition to creating the company and contact (or finding and using existing records if they're already in Accelo), you can also specify the values for the Contract and its Period Template (how often to renew, including prepaid hours or value, what it should cost, whether it should roll over, etc). If you don't provide these additional values, the defaults for the "type" will be used. The features of setting custom fields, uploading files and sending emails/activities to individuals or groups of users are also supported.
For more information on the fields we support and how to use this API, visit our Retainer Forms API documentation page.
Common Features
The Forms API also has a few common features. You can pass these in as hidden or select-option style parameters to control the flow/processing of your forms.
- Redirection: to ensure your user is redirected to a "thankyou" page or URL of your choice once a form submission has been successfully made, you can pass in the "redirect" parameter. Example: <input type="hidden" name="redirect" value="https://www.yoursite.com/thankyou.html">
Examples
Nothing helps better when developing than great, well documented examples! The great news is that we have a specially build page which contains working examples of all of our Form APIs in use - you can actually use it on your own domain right now just by changing the deployment name at the top of the page and filling in a form of your choice!
To see the examples, visit help.accelo.com/_resources/app/dev/forms.html, and use "View Source" to see extensive comments that cover how you can use all the different fields in your own forms.