Summary

This document describes the guidelines for integrating with the Sparkfly Squirrel Extension.

Intended Audience

This document is useful for developing additional Squirrel extensions or software that will integrate with our Squirrel extension. For instance, if you are an online ordering provider and wish to apply loyalty or coupon credentials to the check in Squirrel and have the Sparkfly extension treat it as a credential of our own.

Adding a Credential to the Check

The Sparkfly extension uses a menu entry item to track applied credentials. A credential can represent a coupon, a loyalty member or any other piece of identifying information tied to an offer, a loyalty account or individual. In order to create credentials on the check, the integrator must create a menu entry using the same PLU that is configured in the Sparkfly extension. This configuration lives in C:\Squirrel\Program\PosData\Sparkfly\Sparkfly.ini. The menu entry is configured as an "Open Name" item in Squirrel. To create a credential on the check, you should use the Squirrel extension API PosUtil.orderOpenPLU(). This item could also be created using the Squirrel Gateway (SqGateway). The name of the item created MUST include the prefix as defined by CREDENTIAL_PREFIX in Sparkfly.ini. For example, with the following config settings:

CREDENTIAL_PLU=1000
CREDENTIAL_PREFIX=SF:

To apply a credential with the value "ABCDEF" at index 0 on the current table:

PosUtil.orderOpenPLU(0, 1000, "SF:ABCDEF", 0);

This function is a Squirrel API function. For details of its operation, please contact your Squirrel development support.

There are important caveats with this system:

  1. The Sparkfly extension will not immediately apply offers to this credential. This will happen once the user opens the table, and either SEND ORDERs, or PRINT CHECKs.
  2. The Sparkfly extension may remove the credential you create, if, in the process of querying the platform, the credential is returned as invalid from the server.

Troubleshooting

Please contact your Sparkfly account representative if you need assistance, or e-mail support@sparkfly.com.