Add a Zendesk source

This is for:

Developer System Administrator

When you have the required privileges, you can add the content of a Zendesk instance to a Coveo organization.

Tip
Leading practice

The number of items that a source processes per hour (crawling speed) depends on various factors, such as network bandwidth and source configuration. See About crawling speed for information on what can impact crawling speed, as well as possible solutions.

Source key characteristics

The following table presents the main characteristics of a Zendesk source.

Features Supported Additional information

Zendesk version

Latest cloud version

Indexable content

Organizations, users, groups, tickets, articles, article comments, and ticket and article attachments

Content update operations

refresh

check

Takes place every hour by default.

rescan

check

rebuild

check

Content security options

Same users and groups as in your content system

check

Specific users and groups

check

Everyone

check

Metadata indexing for search

Automatic mapping of metadata to fields that have the same name

This setting is disabled by default and not recommended for this source type.

Automatically indexed metadata

Examples of auto-populated default fields (no user-defined metadata required):
 

  • clickableuri

  • title

  • zendeskcreationdate

  • zendesksubmittername

  • zendeskticketstatus
     

After a content update, inspect your item field values in the Content Browser.

Extracted but not indexed metadata

The Zendesk source extracts some of the metadata that the Zendesk API makes available.
 

After a rebuild, review the View and map metadata subpage for the list of indexed metadata, and index additional metadata.
Notes

  • Users may see limited results when performing searches against secured content while on Zendesk Guide sites.

  • If you set the content option to Everyone, apply additional filtering to ensure that your content is accessible to the intended audience.

Add a Zendesk source

Tip
Leading practice

It’s best to create or edit your source in your sandbox organization first. Once you’ve confirmed that it indexes the desired content, you can copy your source configuration to your production organization, either with a snapshot or manually.

See About non-production organizations for more information and best practices regarding sandbox organizations.

  1. Create a Zendesk administrator crawling account dedicated to your Coveo source. This account must have access to the content you want to index.

  2. Log out of your Zendesk session. In a couple steps, you’ll need to log in to Zendesk with the crawling account you just created. If you remain logged in with your personal account, Zendesk will automatically log you in with this account instead.

  3. On the Sources (platform-ca | platform-eu | platform-au) page of the Coveo Administration Console, click Add source, and then select Zendesk.

  4. Enter a Name for your source.

    Tip
    Leading practice

    A source name can’t be modified once it’s saved, therefore be sure to use a short and descriptive name, using letters, numbers, hyphens (-), and underscores (_). Avoid spaces and other special characters.

  5. Click Authorize account.

  6. In the window that opens, enter your Zendesk subdomain name, and then click Sign in. For example, if your Zendesk URL is https://subdomain.zendesk.com, enter subdomain.

  7. Log in with the crawling account you created earlier.

  8. Click Allow to grant Coveo access to your Zendesk account. You’ll then be redirected back to the Coveo Administration Console.

  9. Optionally, under Project, select the project you want to associate your source with.

  10. Click Add source.

  11. Specify your source settings. Refer to the following sections for detailed information on the source settings:

"Configuration" tab

The Configuration tab lets you manage the content to index, authentication methods, and advanced settings of your source. These configuration groups are presented in subtabs.

"Content to index" subtab

The Content to index subtab lets you define the content that you want to make available as search results.

Locale

By default, Coveo indexes items in American English (en-us). To index items in a different language, enter the corresponding locale code. For example, enter de to index content in German.

Tickets

To index Agent Workspace tickets, check the corresponding box.

When you do so, you can then choose to index:

  • Archived and deleted tickets.

  • Tickets from specific organizations only.

  • Tickets with specific tags only.

Articles

To index articles from the Help Center, check the corresponding box. When you do so, you can choose to index article translations as well.

Additional content

Select additional content to index: message attachments, user data, and/or message tags.

"Authentication" subtab

The Authentication subtab shows your Zendesk instance address and the user account that the source uses to authenticate to Zendesk.

To change the account with which the source authenticates, or to change the Zendesk instance to index:

  1. Click Re-authorize.

  2. In the window that opens, enter your Zendesk subdomain name, and then click Sign in. For example, if your Zendesk URL is https://subdomain.zendesk.com, enter subdomain.

  3. Log in with the crawling account you created earlier.

  4. Click Allow to grant Coveo access to your Zendesk account. You’ll then be redirected back to the Coveo Administration Console.

"Identification" subtab

The Identification subtab contains general information about the source.

Use the Project selector to associate your source with one or more Coveo projects.

"Items" tab

On the Items tab, you can specify how the source handles items based on their file type or content type.

File types

File types let you define how the source handles items based on their file extension or content type. For each file type, you can specify whether to index the item content and metadata, only the item metadata, or neither.

You should fine-tune the file type configurations with the objective of indexing only the content that’s relevant to your users.

Example

Your repository contains .pdf files, but you don’t want them to appear in search results. You click Extensions and then, for the .pdf extension, you change the Default action and Action on error values to Ignore item.

For more details about this feature, see File type handling.

Content and images

If you want Coveo to extract text from image files or PDF files containing images, enable the appropriate option. The extracted text is processed as item data, meaning that it’s fully searchable and will appear in the item Quick view.

Note

When OCR is enabled, ensure the source’s relevant file type configurations index the item content. Indexing the item’s metadata only or ignoring the item will prevent OCR from being applied.

See Enable optical character recognition for details on this feature.

"Content security" tab

Select who will be able to access the source items through a Coveo-powered search interface. For details on the content security options, see Content security.

If you select "Same users and groups as in your content system"

When you want to replicate your Zendesk instance’s permission system in your Coveo-powered search interface, select the permission scope to index with your Zendesk content. In other words, determine who should have access to the indexed content.

If you select Specific organizations only, enter the ID of the desired organizations.

"Access" tab

On the Access tab, specify whether each group (and API key, if applicable) in your Coveo organization can view or edit the current source.

For example, when creating a new source, you could decide that members of Group A can edit its configuration, while Group B can only view it.

For more information, see Custom access level.

Build the source

  1. Finish adding or editing your source:

    • When you’re done editing the source and want to make your changes effective, click Add and build source/Save and rebuild source.

    • When you want to save your source configuration changes without starting a build/rebuild, such as when you know you want to make other changes soon, click Add source/Save. On the Sources (platform-ca | platform-eu | platform-au) page, click Launch build or Start required rebuild when you’re ready to make your changes effective and index your content.

  2. On the Sources (platform-ca | platform-eu | platform-au) page, follow the progress of your source addition or modification.

  3. Once the source is built or rebuilt, review its content in the Content Browser.

Index metadata

To use metadata values in search interface facets or result templates, the metadata must be mapped to fields. Coveo automatically maps only a subset of the metadata it extracts. You must map any additional metadata to fields manually.

Note

Not clear on the purpose of indexing metadata? Watch this video.

  1. On the Sources (platform-ca | platform-eu | platform-au) page, click your source, and then click More > View and map metadata in the Action bar.

  2. Review the default metadata that your source is extracting from your content.

  3. Map any currently not indexed metadata that you want to use in facets or result templates to fields.

    1. Click the metadata and then, at the top right, click Add to Index.

    2. In the Apply a mapping on all item types of a source panel, select the field you want to map the metadata to, or add a new field if none of the existing fields are appropriate.

      Note

      For advanced mapping configurations, like applying a mapping to a specific item type, see Manage mappings.

    3. Click Apply mapping.

  4. Return to the Sources (platform-ca | platform-eu | platform-au) page.

  5. To reindex your source with your new mappings, click your source, and then click More > Rebuild in the Action bar.

  6. Once the source is rebuilt, review your item field values. They should now include the values of the metadata you selected to index.

    1. On the Sources (platform-ca | platform-eu | platform-au) page, click your source, and then click More > Open in Content Browser in the Action bar.

    2. Select the card of the item for which you want to inspect properties, and then click Properties in the Action bar.

    3. In the panel that appears, select the Fields tab.

Required privileges

You can assign privileges to allow access to specific tools in the Coveo Administration Console. The following table indicates the privileges required to view or edit elements of the Sources (platform-ca | platform-eu | platform-au) page and associated panels. See Manage privileges and Privilege reference for more information.

Note

The Edit all privilege isn’t required to create sources. When granting privileges for the Sources domain, you can grant a group or API key the View all or Custom access level, instead of Edit all, and then select the Can Create checkbox to allow users to create sources. See Can Create ability dependence for more information.
Actions Service Domain Required access level

View sources, view source update schedules, and subscribe to source notifications

Content

Fields

View

Sources

Organization

Organization

Edit sources, edit source update schedules, and edit source mappings

Organization

Organization

View

Content

Fields

Edit

Sources

View and map metadata

Content

Source metadata

View

Fields

Organization

Organization

Content

Sources

Edit

What’s next?

Schedule source updates.