I’m experimenting with an online course built in Interfaces. I’m realizing (a bit late) that Interfaces may be an abandoned project, as direct help queries aren’t being addresses within 1 week, and “office hours” have been suspended since September.
My question isn’t too exotic. I’d like to restrict access to the course to users with permission, based on email. Interfaces allows you to manually enter/delete one record at a time for this purpose.
Is it possible to upload eligible users into the table, or synch with a table in Google Sheets? Or am I stuck manually adding/deleting one record at a time?
As best as I can tell (given that no documentation exists), they way course access would work is: (1) a prospective user enters their email on a login page; (2) for a permitted user (exists in Interface instance’s users list), a 6-digit code is sent by email for use in logging in. If the user’s email isn’t in the users’ list, no email is sent (and no notification of any kind is displayed).\ The login page can not be customized as far as I can tell, neither can the email notification which comes from Zapier (so, sure to confuse a prospective course taker), nor can a Zap be created to modify this work flow (to notify an unlisted user they lack permission, for example) as this option isn’t a trigger available for Interfaces Zaps.
But, maybe I’m missing something opr taking the wrong approach? Any ideas appreciated on this.
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Hi @RJK
Good question.
Interfaces is definitely not an abandoned project and in active development. (e.g. See Templates: https://zapier.com/templates)
I’m aware of the templates, are they the best evidence you have that the platform isn’t abandoned? The course I’m building came from one of them; it’s not really very complete.
Zapier’s help resources related to Interface, especially the collection of short articles you linked to that treat a very small set of the very simplest functions in superficial detail, are not helpful.
Nor, unfortunately, is submitting a help ticket, as I did that more than one week ago without an answer.
I do appreciate that you took the time to reply, perhaps I should have explained that I already explored these obvious options, and they offer little help.
@RJK
Templates are a new endeavor that includes Interfaces, so that would indicate a positive direction.
I expect resources for Interfaces will continue to grow in due time.
There was a new feature announced on Friday Nov 7, 2023 related to Query Parameters on embedded forms, which would be another indicator that dev on Interfaces is active.
@RJK
Are you part of the ZapierEarlyAccess Community on Slack?
I think so? Is the link you included somehow related to Slack?
@RJK
The link has content about the Slack community related to being a part of the Zapier Early Access program.
Hi @RJK,
I responded to your post on Reddit but can provide more details here. The Community here is your best bet outside of Support.
We actually do have some automated options to setup users on your Interface.
Part 1: Setup a Form where students can submit their emails. That could be a form in Interfaces or any other form app you’d like to use.
Part 2: Upon submission of that form, trigger a Zap to add them to Interfaces. In the Editor (where you build Zaps), search for “Interfaces” and you’ll find the app that enables you to Create or Remove users from your Interfaces project (as displayed below). Sounds like you already found the “Managed Users” setting within Interfaces. With that enabled, you can add/remove users automatically via Zaps. They won’t receive an email notification automatically, so if you want to notify them you can add another step to your Zap to do so.
Here’s what that Zap could look like:
Hope that helps! Let me know if you have any questions along the way.
@Troy Tessalone the link you provided mentions the Slack channel support, but offers no link to it. Which begs the question, why include it? Is it somehow considered important to respond to posts here with a link, regardless of their usefulness? Seems to be a lot of that. As others have commented, Zapier hasn’t made it easy to find/join this Slack group. To be honest, I wonder why its needed in addition to “official” Zapier help AND this community. I am sorry to be a scold.
On the other hand, thanks @Lars this looks promising I will give it a try, very much appreciate your response!
@RJK
In the access confirmation email for Zapier Early Access, it included a link to join the Slack community.
@Lars Thanks again for this response. Using a form would facilitate adding users, but my use case involves gating access. So, an unauthorized user would not be able to gain access right away, while an authorized user would. Authorization would be based on whether or not the email exists in an authorized users table (in this case, the default table associated with the Interfaces instance).
Would adding this level of functionality simply involve an additional step in the zap that looks up the entry in the table, and determines whether there is a match? I’m not sure what zap would best do that, but I seem to remember seeing a capability in Zapier to do this. Any deas?
Yes, that’s right @RJK . You could use the Interfaces action called “Find User” to see if they exist in the Interface already. Or if you stored a list outside of Interfaces (in Tables or Google Sheets for example), you could look them up there as well.
