Cmdlets for Zoho Inventory

Build 24.0.9060

Establishing a Connection

With the CData Cmdlets users can install a data module, set the connection properties, and start scripting. This section provides examples of using our Zoho Inventory Cmdlets with native PowerShell cmdlets, like the CSV import and export cmdlets.

Installing and Connecting

If you have PSGet, installing the cmdlets can be accomplished from the PowerShell Gallery with the following command. You can also obtain a setup from the CData site. 

Install-Module Zoho InventoryCmdlets

The following line is then added to your profile, loading the cmdlets on the next session: 

Import-Module Zoho InventoryCmdlets;

You can then use the Connect-ZohoInventory cmdlet to create a connection object that can be passed to other cmdlets: 

$conn = Connect-ZohoInventory -InitiateOAuth "GETANDREFRESH" -OrganizationId "YourOrganizationId"

Connecting to Zoho Inventory

The cmdlet leverages OAuth for authentication.

Desktop Applications

When connecting with a desktop application (when the cmdlet is running on the same machine as your web browser), you can connect using either your own OAuth app or the embedded OAuth app provided by CData.

CData provides an OAuth app that has been preregistered with Zoho Inventory, saving you the step of having to create your own OAuth app. To use the embedded app, proceed without creating a custom OAuth app and omit any connection properties designated as "custom applications only".

Alternatively, you can create a custom OAuth application. See Creating a Custom OAuth App for information about creating custom applications and reasons for doing so.

After setting the following connection properties, you are ready to connect:

  • InitiateOAuth: Set this to GETANDREFRESH, which instructs the cmdlet to automatically attempt to get and refresh the OAuth access token.
  • OAuthClientId (custom applications only): Set this to the Client Id that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.
  • OAuthClientSecret (custom applications only): Set this to the Client Secret that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.
When you connect, the cmdlet opens the OAuth endpoint in your default browser. Log in and grant permissions to the application. The cmdlet then completes the OAuth process as follows:

  • Extracts the access token from the callback URL.
  • Obtains a new access token when the old one expires.
  • Saves OAuth values in OAuthSettingsLocation that persist across connections.

Web Applications

When connecting via a web application (when the cmdlet is not running on the same machine as your web browser), you need to create and register a custom OAuth application with Zoho Inventory. You can then use the cmdlet to acquire and manage the OAuth token values. See Creating a Custom OAuth App for more information about custom applications.

Get an OAuth Access Token

Set the following connection properties to obtain the OAuthAccessToken:

  • OAuthClientId: Set this to the Client Id that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.
  • OAuthClientSecret: Set this to the Client Secret that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.

Then call stored procedures to complete the OAuth exchange:

  1. Call the GetOAuthAuthorizationURL stored procedure. Set the CallbackURL input to the Authorized Redirect URI you specified in your custom OAuth application's settings. The stored procedure returns the URL to the OAuth endpoint.
  2. Navigate the user to the URL that the stored procedure returned in Step 1. After the user authenticates and authorizes to the custom OAuth application, the browser redirects the user to the callback URL with a "code" parameter appended to the end.
  3. Call the GetOAuthAccessToken stored procedure. Set AuthMode to WEB and the Verifier input to the "code" parameter in the query string of the callback URL.

Once you have obtained the access and refresh tokens, you can connect to data and refresh the OAuth access token either automatically or manually.

Automatic Refresh of the OAuth Access Token

To have the driver automatically refresh the OAuth access token, set the following on the first data connection:

  • InitiateOAuth: Set this to REFRESH.
  • OAuthClientId: Set this to the Client Id that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.
  • OAuthClientSecret: Set this to the Client Secret that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.
  • OAuthAccessToken: Set this to the access token returned by GetOAuthAccessToken.
  • OAuthRefreshToken: Set this to the refresh token returned by GetOAuthAccessToken.
  • OAuthSettingsLocation: Set this to the location where the cmdlet saves the OAuth token values that persist across connections.
On subsequent data connections, the values for OAuthAccessToken and OAuthRefreshToken are taken from OAuthSettingsLocation.

Manual Refresh of the OAuth Access Token

The only value needed to manually refresh the OAuth access token when connecting to data is the OAuth refresh token.

Use the RefreshOAuthAccessToken stored procedure to manually refresh the OAuthAccessToken after the ExpiresIn parameter value returned by GetOAuthAccessToken has elapsed, then set the following connection properties:

  • InitiateOAuth: Set this to the OFF.
  • OAuthClientId: Set this to the Client Id in your application settings.
  • OAuthClientSecret: Set this to the Client Secret in your application settings.

Then call RefreshOAuthAccessToken with OAuthRefreshToken set to the OAuth refresh token returned by GetOAuthAccessToken. After the new tokens have been retrieved, open a new connection by setting the OAuthAccessToken property to the value returned by RefreshOAuthAccessToken.

Finally, store the OAuth refresh token so that you can use it to manually refresh the OAuth access token after it has expired.

Headless Machines

To configure the driver to use OAuth with a user account on a headless machine, you need to authenticate on another device that has an internet browser.

  1. Choose one of two options:
    • Option 1: Obtain the OAuthVerifier value as described in "Obtain and Exchange a Verifier Code" below.
    • Option 2: Install the cmdlet on a machine with an Internet browser and transfer the OAuth authentication values after you authenticate through the usual browser-based flow, as described in "Transfer OAuth Settings" below.
  2. Then configure the cmdlet to automatically refresh the access token on the headless machine.

Option 1: Obtain and Exchange a Verifier Code

To obtain a verifier code, you must authenticate at the OAuth authorization URL.

Follow the steps below to authenticate from the machine with an Internet browser and obtain the OAuthVerifier connection property.

  1. Choose one of these options:
    • If you are using the Embedded OAuth Application, call the GetOAuthAuthorizationURL stored procedure with the appropriate CallbackURL. Open the URL returned by the stored procedure in a browser.
    • If you are using a custom OAuth application, create the Authorization URL by setting the following properties:
      • InitiateOAuth: Set to OFF.
      • OAuthClientId: Set to the client Id assigned when you registered your application.
      • OAuthClientSecret: Set to the client secret assigned when you registered your application.
      Then call the GetOAuthAuthorizationURL stored procedure with the appropriate CallbackURL. Open the URL returned by the stored procedure in a browser.
  2. Log in and grant permissions to the cmdlet. You are then redirected to the callback URL, which contains the verifier code.
  3. Save the value of the verifier code. Later you will set this in the OAuthVerifier connection property.
Next, you need to exchange the OAuth verifier code for OAuth refresh and access tokens. Set the following properties:

On the headless machine, set the following connection properties to obtain the OAuth authentication values:

  • InitiateOAuth: Set this to REFRESH.
  • OAuthVerifier: Set this to the verifier code.
  • OAuthClientId (custom applications only): Set this to the Client Id that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.
  • OAuthClientSecret (custom applications only): Set this to the Client Secret that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.
  • OAuthSettingsLocation: Set this to persist the encrypted OAuth authentication values to the specified location.

Attempt a connection. If the cmdlet reports a successful connection, the OAuth settings file will have been generated in the location specified in OAuthSettingsLocation.

Clear the OAuthVerifier from your cmdlet settings:

  • InitiateOAuth: Set this to REFRESH.
  • OAuthClientId (custom applications only): Set this to the Client Id that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.
  • OAuthClientSecret (custom applications only): Set this to the Client Secret that was displayed upon creation of your custom OAuth app.
  • OAuthSettingsLocation: Set this to the location containing the encrypted OAuth authentication values. Make sure this location gives read and write permissions to the cmdlet to enable the automatic refreshing of the access token.

Option 2: Transfer OAuth Settings

Prior to connecting on a headless machine, you need to create and install a connection with the driver on a device that supports an Internet browser. Set the connection properties as described in "Desktop Applications" above.

After completing the instructions in "Desktop Applications", the resulting authentication values are encrypted and written to the location specified by OAuthSettingsLocation. The default filename is OAuthSettings.txt.

Once you have successfully tested the connection, copy the OAuth settings file to your headless machine.

On the headless machine, set the following connection properties to connect to data:

  • InitiateOAuth: Set this to REFRESH.
  • OAuthClientId: (custom applications only) Set this to the client Id assigned when you registered your application.
  • OAuthClientSecret: (custom applications only) Set this to the client secret assigned when you registered your application.
  • OAuthSettingsLocation: Set this to the path to your OAuth settings file. Make sure this path gives read and write permissions to the cmdlet to enable the automatic refreshing of the access token.

Retrieving Data

The Select-ZohoInventory cmdlet provides a native PowerShell interface for retrieving data: 

$results = Select-ZohoInventory -Connection $conn -Table "Contacts" -Columns @("Id, CustomerName") -Where "FirstName='Test'"
The Invoke-ZohoInventory cmdlet provides an SQL interface. This cmdlet can be used to execute an SQL query via the Query parameter.

Piping Cmdlet Output

The cmdlets return row objects to the pipeline one row at a time. The following line exports results to a CSV file: 

Select-ZohoInventory -Connection $conn -Table Contacts -Where "FirstName = 'Test'" | Select -Property * -ExcludeProperty Connection,Table,Columns | Export-Csv -Path c:\myContactsData.csv -NoTypeInformation

You will notice that we piped the results from Select-ZohoInventory into a Select-Object cmdlet and excluded some properties before piping them into an Export-CSV cmdlet. We do this because the CData Cmdlets append Connection, Table, and Columns information onto each row object in the result set, and we do not necessarily want that information in our CSV file.

However, this makes it easy to pipe the output of one cmdlet to another. The following is an example of converting a result set to JSON: 

 
PS C:\> $conn  = Connect-ZohoInventory -InitiateOAuth "GETANDREFRESH" -OrganizationId "YourOrganizationId"
PS C:\> $row = Select-ZohoInventory -Connection $conn -Table "Contacts" -Columns (Id, CustomerName) -Where "FirstName = 'Test'" | select -first 1
PS C:\> $row | ConvertTo-Json
{
  "Connection":  {

  },
  "Table":  "Contacts",
  "Columns":  [

  ],
  "Id":  "MyId",
  "CustomerName":  "MyCustomerName"
}

Deleting Data

The following line deletes any records that match the criteria: 

Select-ZohoInventory -Connection $conn -Table Contacts -Where "FirstName = 'Test'" | Remove-ZohoInventory

Modifying Data

The cmdlets make data transformation easy as well as data cleansing. The following example loads data from a CSV file into Zoho Inventory, checking first whether a record already exists and needs to be updated instead of inserted. 

Import-Csv -Path C:\MyContactsUpdates.csv | %{
  $record = Select-ZohoInventory -Connection $conn -Table Contacts -Where ("Id = `'"+$_.Id+"`'")
  if($record){
    Update-ZohoInventory -Connection $conn -Table Contacts -Columns @("Id","CustomerName") -Values @($_.Id, $_.CustomerName) -Where "Id  = `'$_.Id`'"
  }else{
    Add-ZohoInventory -Connection $conn -Table Contacts -Columns @("Id","CustomerName") -Values @($_.Id, $_.CustomerName)
  }
}

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Build 24.0.9060