Custom Web Application Integration

The ECMP Zero Footprint Client office integration can also be used from a custom web application. The document can be opened in the corresponding Microsoft Office application by navigating to a special URL. The custom web application is responsible for the creation of the correct URL. You can find the structure of this at URL at https://docs.microsoft.com/office/client-developer/office-uri-schemes. The URL must match the configuration of the ECMP ZFC Server. This diagram shows how the different elements should be combined together to build a valid URL.

path

The URL contains the following elements:

  • The scheme-name is coupled to the type of the document you want to open. For Microsoft Word documents the value is ms-word, for Excel documents ms-excel and for PowerPoint you should use the value ms-powerpoint. Check the Microsoft documentation if you want to support other file types.

  • The server-url and the optional path-prefix should correspond to the values specified in the application configuration in the General Configuration section.

  • The document-path has the following structure:

document-path

For the document path there are a few rules you have to follow:

  • If the object store is hidden then this path should not include the name of the object store.
  • If the document title does not end with a file extension then an extension corresponding to the file type should be appended to the document title, e.g. .docx for Microsoft Word documents.
  • The path may optionally contain extra information in the token section. Note that this information may also contain extra forward slashes.

If you have constructed a valid path, then the simplest way to test this is to construct a simple href-link in your webpage:

<a href="ms-word:https://www.example.com/zfc/OS/editdocument/{80CFF080-0000-CF1D-931E-1AAE33E32773}/file-sample.docx">file-sample.docx</a>

This will open the document in Microsoft Word. The application will handle the authentication of the user.

You can also use JavaScript to open the Office document from a webpage. This function will open the URL supplied as the argument: 

function openURI(uri) {
    function createIframe(){
        var iframe = document.createElement("iframe");
        iframe.style.visibility = 'hidden';
        iframe.style.display = 'none';
        iframe.src = uri;
        document.body.appendChild(iframe);
    }

    setTimeout(createIframe, 5);
}