Microsoft Teams Message Extensions

In this section, we will set up a message extension for enabling searching for entities.

We start by going into the settings for the app we want to configure:

2. In the WorkPoint App Builder, click the App you want to configure message extensions for. In this case, that would be the "Projects" app.

3. In the side panel of the app settings, under "Capabilities", we click "Message extensions".

4. In the "Message Extensions" menu, we can add a new message extension by clicking the "Add" button.

5. We can now select which type of extension command we want to create. As we want to be able to search for and display an entity, we select the "WorkPoint Search" option.

We are now presented with the following options for the extension command:

In this instance, we want to be able to search for entities across all business modules. We want to be able to run this command from everywhere possible. We therefore configure the command like so:

6. We provide a name for the command. We prefix the name with  "e" to indicate that this command searches for entities.
7. We also provide a short description for what the command does.
8. Next, we select which WorkPoint Search Setting to use for searching for entities. In this case, we use the standard "Entity Search" Search Setting, but you could potentially create your own Search Setting and use that here. You can read more about creating Search Settings in this article.
9. If the Search Setting selected in pt. 8, we can choose which result group to use for finding search results. In this case, we want to search across all business modules, but we could potentially select a result group which only find e.g. projects or companies, or results from other business modules on the solution. The "All" option here fetches results from all business modules on our solution.
10. Lastly, we select from where this particular extension command can be run. In this case, we enable all options. "Command Box" is the top middle bar in the Microsoft Teams interface. "Compose Box" refers to the message compose box in the Chat, i.e. from where you type chat messages to other users.
11. We click the "Save" button to save the extension command.

The extension command is now saved and can be  inspected in the "Message Extensions" page in the WorkPoint App Builder:

12. The message extension command appears in a list of commands on the page.
13. Clicking the three ellipses icon reveals options for the command.
14. The "Edit" options allows you to edit the settings of the command in a window similar to when creating a new command.
15. The "Delete" option deletes to selected command.
16. You can use the "Move Up" and "Move Down" options to reorder the commands in the commands list.

In order to make the message extension commands work, we need to upload the new version of the app:

17. In the side panel of the app settings, under "Finish", we click "Package and distribute".
18. Under "Download" we click the download button. The new version of the app should now be located as a .zip file in the download folder of your device.

Next, we will uninstall the old version of the app from Microsoft Teams:

19. In Microsoft Teams, in the side panel, we click the "More added apps" button.
20. We right-click our WorkPoint App and select "Uninstall".

21. We confirm that we want to uninstall the app.

We can now upload the new version of the app:

22. In the side panel of Microsoft Teams, we click the "More added apps" button.
23. We then click "More apps".

24. In the side menu of the "Apps" page, we click "Upload a custom app".
25. We then click "Upload for me or my teams".

26. We now browse to the newly downloaded version of the Projects app and select it.
27. Next, we click the "Open" button.

28. In the pop-up window, we click the "Add" button.

The app is now uploaded and added to Microsoft Teams, and it should now open in the Microsoft Teams interface:

We can now test if the extension command works.

As we enabled the extension command to be used from the "Compose box" context, we will create a new chat with an employee and link to a Project entity there:

29. In the chat, we start by typing the command "@Projects". The at sign in this context indicates that we want to use a message extension command. The name after the at sign is the name of the WorkPoint App from which we want to run a command.
30. We can either press Enter on the keyboard or click the "Projects" suggestion.

31. We can now type in the name of the command we wish to run. In this case, we created a command called "eSearch", so we type in the name of the command.
32. We can either press Enter on the keyboard or select the "eSearch" suggestion.

33. We can now type in a search query for the search setting to use. In this case, we perform a search for "development".
34. The search results are shown in a pop-up window. Here, we can select which entity we want to activate.
35. In this example, we select the "Development of new Pump" search result.

36. The adaptive card for the selected entity is now displayed in the message. It is not yet sent at this point, but simply added to the  message being authored at the moment.
37. Optionally, we can add a message as normal to the chat before sending the message.
38. To send the message we can click the "Send" button or simply press Enter on the keyboard.

39. The message is now sent and the WorkPoint entity, represented in the adaptive card can be inspected and even interacted with using the buttons on the card.

In this section, we will set up a message extension for enabling searching for entities.

We start by going into the settings for the app we want to configure:

40. In the WorkPoint App Builder, click the App you want to configure message extensions for. In this case, that would be the "Projects" app.

41. In the side panel of the app settings, under "Capabilities", we click "Message extensions".

42. In the "Message Extensions" menu, we can add a new message extension by clicking the "Add" button.

43. We can now select which type of extension command we want to create. As we want to be able to search for documents, we select the "WorkPoint Search" option.

We are now presented with the following options for the extension command:

In this instance, we want to be able to search for documents. We also want to be able to run this command from everywhere possible. We therefore configure the command like so:

44. We provide a name for the command. We prefix the name with  "d" to indicate that this command searches for documents.
45. We also provide a short description for what the command does.
46. Next, we select which WorkPoint Search Setting to use for searching for documents. In this case, we use the standard "Document Search" Search Setting, but you could potentially create your own Search Setting and use that here. You can read more about creating Search Settings in this article.
47. If the Search Setting selected in pt. 46, we can choose which result group to use for finding search results. In this case, the default Document Search search setting only has the "All" result group.
48. Lastly, we select from where this particular extension command can be run. In this case, we enable all options. "Command Box" is the top middle bar in the Microsoft Teams interface. "Compose Box" refers to the message compose box in the Chat, i.e. from where you type chat messages to other users.
49. We click the "Save" button to save the extension command.

The extension command is now saved and can be inspected in the "Message Extensions" page in the WorkPoint App Builder:

50. The message extension command appears in a list of commands on the page.
51. Clicking the three ellipses icon reveals options for the command.
52. The "Edit" options allows you to edit the settings of the command in a window similar to when creating a new command.
53. The "Delete" option deletes to selected command.
54. You can use the "Move Up" and "Move Down" options to reorder the commands in the commands list.

In order to make the message extension commands work, we need to upload the new version of the app:

55. In the side panel of the app settings, under "Finish", we click "Package and distribute".
56. Under "Download" we click the download button. The new version of the app should now be located as a .zip file in the download folder of your device.

Next, we will uninstall the old version of the app from Microsoft Teams:

57. In Microsoft Teams, in the side panel, we click the "More added apps" button.
58. We right-click our WorkPoint App and select "Uninstall".

59. We confirm that we want to uninstall the app.

We can now upload the new version of the app:

60. In the side panel of Microsoft Teams, we click the "More added apps" button.
61. We then click "More apps".

62. In the side menu of the "Apps" page, we click "Upload a custom app".
63. We then click "Upload for me or my teams".

64. We now browse to the newly downloaded version of the Projects app and select it.
65. Next, we click the "Open" button.

66. In the pop-up window, we click the "Add" button.

The app is now uploaded and added to Microsoft Teams, and it should now open in the Microsoft Teams interface:

We can now test if the extension command works.

As we enabled the extension command to be used from the "Compose box" context, we will create a new chat with an employee and link to a Project entity there:

67. In the chat, we start by typing the command "@Projects". The at sign in this context indicates that we want to use a message extension command. The name after the at sign is the name of the WorkPoint App from which we want to run a command.
68. We can either press Enter on the keyboard or click the "Projects" suggestion.

69. We can now type in the name of the command we wish to run. In this case, we created a command called "dSearch", so we type in the name of the command.
70. We can either press Enter on the keyboard or select the "dSearch" suggestion.

71. We can now type in a search query for the search setting to use. In this case, we perform a search for "budget".
72. The search results are shown in a pop-up window. Here, we can select which document we want to activate.
73. In this example, we select the "Design budget" document from the "Development of new Pump" project.

74. A card for the selected document is now displayed in the message. It is not yet sent at this point, but simply added to the message being authored at the moment.
75. Optionally, we can add a message as normal to the chat before sending the message.
76. To send the message we can click the "Send" button or simply press Enter on the keyboard.

77. The message is now sent and the document, represented in the card can be opened using the button on the card.

In this section, we will set up a message extension command which opens the Entity wizard, allowing us to create new entities from the Microsoft Teams interface.

In this case, we will set up the command to open the Entity wizard in the context of the Projects business module on our solution. This means that the command is used for creating new Project entities.

We start by going to the Message Extensions settings for the WorkPoint App:

78. In the WorkPoint App Builder, click the app for which you wish to set up the Wizard message extension command.

79. In the side menu of the App Details page, under "Capabilities" click "Message extensions".

80. On the "Message Extensions" page, click the "Add" button to add a new command.

81. As we want to set up the command to open a Wizard, we select "Wizard" for the command type.

This opens the configuration window for the new extension command, which we configure in the following way:

82. We provide the extension command with the name "CreateProject". This is also the name of the command we need to call when we want to use the command.
83. We also add a description for what the command does.
84. We then select which wizard we want to open using the command. In our case, we want to open the "Entity" wizard.
85. Next, we select which business module context the Entity wizard should be opened in. As we want the command to be used for creating new projects, we select the "Projects" business module. If we wanted to make the command more generic to be able to make any type of entity on the WorkPoint solution, we could select "Any" here. This would allow us to select the context when the wizard opens.
86. Lastly, we select that we want to be able to run the command from all possible locations inside Microsoft Teams, including from a message in Chat.
87. We then click the "Save" button.

The extension command should now appear in the list of commands:

You can edit the command by clicking the three ellipses icon:

88. Click the three ellipses icon to open the settings menu for the command.
89. Click "Edit" to edit the settings of the command.
90. Click "Delete" to delete the command.
91. Click "Move Up" or "Move Down" to reorder the command in the list.

Since we have made edits to an already existing WorkPoint App for Teams, we need to redistribute the app and replace the new one with the old one.

We start by downloading the new version:

92. In the side menu of the WorkPoint App Builder, we click "Package & distribute".

93. We then click the "Download" button. The new version of the app should now download into the default download folder of your device.

We now uninstall the old version of the app:

94. In the side panel of Microsoft Teams, click the "More added apps" button.
95. Right-click the existing WorkPoint App which you wish to replace.
96. Click "Uninstall".

97. Confirm the removal of the app.

We can now install the new version of the app:

98. In the side panel of Microsoft Teams, click the "More added apps" button.
99. Click "More apps".

100. In the "Apps" page, click "Upload a custom app".
101. Click "Upload for me or my teams".

102. Browse your device and locate the new version of the app which was previously downloaded.
103. Click the "Open" button.

104. In the App Details page, click "Add".

The app should now be added, and you should be sent to the default tab of the app:

We can now try and test the Entity Wizard command in various locations.

We start in the Microsoft Teams Search bar. To demonstrate that the commands can be called from any page in Microsoft Teams, we here call it from the "Calendar" page:

105. In the Search bar, we start typing an at sigh, followed by the name of the WorkPoint App from which we want to call a command. In this case, that is the "Projects" app, but we only need to type a bit of the name for Microsoft Teams to suggest the full name. Once the suggestion is made, we can either click it or simply press Enter to accept the suggestion.

106. Once we have selected the Projects app, the Search bar now shows us a list of available extension commands. These are the commands that are currently set up for the selected app. We can see that the "CreateProject" command we created earlier is one of them. We can either click it, or select it by using the arrow keys and pressing Enter to accept the selection.

Once we select the "CreateProject" command the Entity wizard should open:

The same command can be used in the Chat:

107. In a chat message, you start by typing an at sign, followed by a part of, or the full name of the app from which you wish to run a command. You can then click the correction provided by Microsoft Teams, or press Enter on the keyboard to accept the suggestion.

108. Next, you can e.g. click "What can I do" to get a list of all the possible commands you can run:

109. You can now select the command you wish to run. In this case, we can run the "CreateProject" command to open the Entity wizard.

Alternatively, we can simply type in the name of the command after we have selected the app:

This process is also demonstrated in the following GIF:

Commands can be run from the command box in Microsoft Teams, which is the search bar in the top middle of the interface:

Running a command from the command box is exemplified in the following GIF:

Message extension commands can be run from the chat message box. This is the box in where you type chat messages in Microsoft Teams Chat:

Running a command from the chat message box is exemplified in the following GIF where we search for a project and send a project presentation card in the chat to a colleague:

Message extension commands can be run from the compose box in Microsoft Teams Chat. This is the bar underneath the chat message box:

In the first example, we will run a command which searches for documents in WorkPoint and send a card for the document in a chat message to a colleague:

In the next example, we run a command which opens a wizard to create new projects in WorkPoint from the compose box: