Dynamic Help Text

Dynamic Help Text provides real-time feedback and contextual assistance to users—based on live conditions inside your plugin's code. It helps users understand what’s happening, especially when something goes wrong.

Rather than showing static instructions, dynamic help adapts to API responses, user inputs, or edge cases—making your plugin easier to debug and more intuitive to use.

Why Use It?

• Guide users when something is misconfigured

• Alert when required data (e.g., column headers) is missing

• Help users resolve issues instantly

• Enhance user experience with real-time suggestions

Example Use Case

Suppose you’re creating an action for Google Sheets to insert a new row. The plugin must know what columns exist—but if the selected sheet has no headers, you should notify the user immediately.

How It Works

You can fetch data using an API call, check a condition, and then return either:

• A valid field structure

• Or a message + empty fields when validation fails

Sample Code

const apiUrl = https://sheets.googleapis.com/v4/spreadsheets/${context.inputData.spreadSheet_id}/values:batchGet?ranges=${context.inputData.sheet_id}!1:1000&valueRenderOption=UNFORMATTED_VALUE;  const headers = {   Authorization: Bearer ${context.authData.accesstokencode.access_token} };  const response = await axios.get(apiUrl, { headers });  let arrToReturn = [];  // ✅ If column headers are found if (response.data?.valueRanges?.[0]?.values?.[0]) {   const headers = response.data.valueRanges[0].values[0];   arrToReturn = headers.map(entry => ({     key: entry,     label: entry,     type: 'string',     required: false,     help: ''   })); }  // ❌ If no headers found else {   arrToReturn = {     children: [],     message: 😕 Didn't see any headers in the provided spreadsheet.  🛠 Did you add headers to the spreadsheet?   If so, refresh this step to pull in the new data.  🔗 [Click here for instructions on setting up your spreadsheet.](https://viasocket.com/faq)   }; }  return arrToReturn; 

How to Use in viaSocket

• Add this code directly in the plugin builder's JavaScript API Call

• Or embed it in JSON using the "source" key (make sure to escape the code using EscapeJSON before pasting)

Pro Tip

You can use this method in any plugin scenario—like:

• Checking authentication validity

• Verifying API credentials

• Ensuring resources (e.g., project ID, table columns) exist

• Alerting for unsupported settings