Send a message

Note:

Before you can get started, you need to do the following:

Set all Conversation API configuration settings.
.Net Core 3.1 SDK and a familiarity with how to create a new console application.

Using the Conversation API, you can send messages to any channel you have configured. This tutorial shows you how to set up and send a message in a .Net Core application.

Steps:

Set up your .Net Core application
Send your first message

Set up your .Net Core application

Create a new folder where you want to keep your app project. Then, open a terminal or command prompt to that location.
Create a new .Net Core console app with the following command:
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```
dotnet new console
```
Add the Newtonsoft.Json NuGet package.
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```
dotnet add package Newtonsoft.Json
```

Modify your application

Note:

This tutorial uses basic authentication for testing purposes. We recommend OAuth 2.0 authentication in a production environment. Read more about authentication methods here.

Open the Program.cs file in your project folder. Replace all of the code in the Main method with the following code:

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SendMessage sendMessage = new SendMessage("App_Id", "Channel", "Identity");
sendMessage.send(sendMessage, "Access_Key", "Access_Secret", "Project_Id");
Console.ReadLine();

Assign your values to the following parameters:

Parameter	Your value
`App_Id`	Find your app ID on your Sinch dashboard.
`Access_Key`	Find your access key on your Sinch dashboard.
`Access_Secret`	Find your access secret on your Sinch dashboard. Note: Access secrets are only available during initial key creation.
`Project_Id`	Find your project ID on your Sinch dashboard.
`Channel`	The channel you want to use to send the message. Available channels are configured for the app on your Sinch dashboard. This guide assumes you've started with an `SMS` channel, but you can use any channel configured for your app: `SMS` `MESSENGER` `MMS` `RCS` `WHATSAPP` `VIBER` `VIBERBM` `INSTAGRAM` `TELEGRAM` `KAKAOTALK` `APPLEBC` `LINE`
`Identity`	The ID of the contact to which you want to send the message.

Save the file.
Next, create a new file in the project folder named Message.cs. Populate that file with the "Message.cs" code found on this page and save the file. This code sends a text message.

Note:

This sample code is configured for the US region. If your Conversation API app wasn't created in the US region, replace all instances of https://us.conversation.api.sinch.com with https://eu.conversation.api.sinch.com in the sample code.

Message.cs

This code sample is to be used with the instructions on this page to build an application that will send a message.

// Find your App ID at dashboard.sinch.com/convapi/apps
// Find your Project ID at dashboard.sinch.com/settings/project-management
// Get your Access Key and Access Secret at dashboard.sinch.com/settings/access-keys
using System;
using System.Net.Http;
using System.Text;
using Newtonsoft.Json;

public class Recipient
{
    public Identified_By identified_by {get; set;}

    public Recipient(string channel, string identity)
    {
        identified_by = new Identified_By(channel, identity);
    }
}
public class Identified_By
{
    public Channel_Identity[] channel_identities {get; set;}

    public Identified_By(string channel, string identity)
    {
        channel_identities = new Channel_Identity[] { new Channel_Identity(channel, identity) };
    }
}
public class Channel_Identity
{
    public string channel {get; set;}
    public string identity {get; set;}

    public Channel_Identity(string channelVar, string idVar)
    {
        channel = channelVar;
        identity = idVar;
    }
}
public class Message
{
    public Text_Message text_message {get; set;}

    public Message()
    {
        text_message = new Text_Message(); 
    }
}
public class Text_Message
{
    public string text {get; set;}

    public Text_Message()
    {
        text = "Text message from Sinch Conversation API.";
    }
}

public class SendMessage
{
    public string app_id {get; set;}
    public Recipient recipient {get; set;}
    public Message message {get; set;}

    public SendMessage(string appIdVar, string channel, string identity)
    {
        app_id = appIdVar;
        recipient = new Recipient(channel, identity);
        message = new Message();
    }   
    
    public string encodeAuth(string key, string secret)
    {
        var plainTextBytes = Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(key + ":" + secret);
        return Convert.ToBase64String(plainTextBytes);
    }

    public async void send(SendMessage sendMessage, string key, string secret, string projectId)
    {
        using (var client = new HttpClient())
        {
            client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Add("Authorization", "Basic " + encodeAuth(key, secret));
            string json = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(sendMessage);
            var postData = new StringContent(json, Encoding.UTF8, "application/json");
            var request = await client.PostAsync("https://us.conversation.api.sinch.com/v1/projects/" + projectId + "/messages:send", postData);
            var response = await request.Content.ReadAsStringAsync();

            Console.WriteLine(response);
        }
    } 
}

Before executing your code, you must first compile your application. Execute the following command:
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```
dotnet build
```

Send your first message

Now you can execute the code and send your test message. Run the following command:

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dotnet run

You should receive a message in your configured messaging platform.

Next steps

Now that you know how to send a message, learn how to handle an incoming message.

Additional resources

Read the links below to learn more: