Retrieve Conversations

Conversations provide the last messages for every one-on-one and group conversation the logged-in user is a part of. This makes it easy for you to build a Recent Chat list.

Retrieve List of Conversations

In other words, as a logged-in user, how do I retrieve the latest conversations that I’ve been a part of?

To fetch the list of conversations, you can use the ConversationsRequest class. To use this class i.e. to create an object of the ConversationsRequest class, you need to use the ConversationsRequestBuilder class. The ConversationsRequestBuilder class allows you to set the parameters based on which the conversations are to be fetched.

The ConversationsRequestBuilder class allows you to set the below parameters:

Set Limit

This method sets the limit i.e. the number of conversations that should be fetched in a single iteration.

Set Limit

let limit = 30;
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .build();

Set Conversation Type

This method can be used to fetch user or group conversations specifically. The conversationType variable can hold one of the below two values:

• user - Only fetches user conversation.
• group - Only fetches group conversations.

If none is set, the list of conversations will include both user and group conversations.

Set Conversation Type

let limit = 30;
let conversationType = "group";
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .setConversationType(conversationType)
  .build();

With User and Group Tags

This method can be used to fetch the user/group tags in the Conversation Object. By default the value is false.

With User and Group Tags

let limit = 30;
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .withUserAndGroupTags(true)
  .build();

Set User Tags

This method fetches user conversations that have the specified tags.

JavaScript

let limit = 30;
let userTags = ["tag1"];
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .setUserTags(userTags)
  .build();

Set Group Tags

This method fetches group conversations that have the specified tags.

JavaScript

let limit = 30;
let groupTags = ["tag1"];
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .setGroupTags(groupTags)
  .build();

With Tags

This method makes sure that the tags associated with the conversations are returned along with the other details of the conversations. The default value for this parameter is false

With Tags

let limit = 30;
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .withTags(true)
  .build();

Set Tags

This method helps you fetch the conversations based on the specified tags.

Set Tags

let limit = 30;
let tags = ["archivedChat"];
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .setTags(tags)
  .build();

Include Blocked Users

This method helps you fetch the conversations of users whom the logged-in user has blocked.

JavaScript

let limit = 30;
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .setIncludeBlockedUsers(true)
  .build();

With Blocked Info

This method can be used to fetch the blocked information of the blocked user in the ConversationWith object.

JavaScript

let limit = 30;
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .setWithBlockedInfo(true)
  .build();

Search Conversations

This method helps you search a conversation based on User or Group name.

This feature is only available with Conversation & Advanced Search. The Conversation & Advanced Search is only available in Advanced & Custom plans. If you’re already on one of these plans, please enable the Conversation & Advanced Search from CometChat Dashboard (Open your app, navigate to Chats -> Settings -> General Configuration)

JavaScript

let limit = 30;
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .setSearchKeyword("Hiking")
  .build();

Unread Conversations

This method helps you fetch unread conversations.

This feature is only available with Conversation & Advanced Search. The Conversation & Advanced Search is only available in Advanced & Custom plans. If you’re already on one of these plans, please enable the Conversation & Advanced Search from CometChat Dashboard (Open your app, navigate to Chats -> Settings -> General Configuration)

JavaScript

let limit = 30;
let conversationRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .setUnread(true)
  .build();

Finally, once all the parameters are set to the builder class, you need to call the build() method to get the object of the ConversationsRequest class.

Once you have the object of the ConversationsRequest class, you need to call the fetchNext() method. Calling this method will return a list of Conversation objects containing X number of users depending on the limit set.

A Maximum of only 50 Conversations can be fetched at once.

Conversations Request

let limit = 30;
let conversationsRequest = new CometChat.ConversationsRequestBuilder()
  .setLimit(limit)
  .build();

conversationsRequest.fetchNext().then(
  conversationList => {
    console.log("Conversations list received:", conversationList);
  }, error => {
    console.log("Conversations list fetching failed with error:", error);
  }
);

The Conversation Object consists of the following fields:

Field	Information
conversationId	ID of the conversation.
conversationType	Type of conversation. (user/group)
lastMessage	Last message the conversation.
conversationWith	User or Group object containing the details of the user or group.
unreadMessageCount	Unread message count for the conversation.

Tag Conversation

In other words, as a logged-in user, how do I tag a conversation?

To tag a specific conversation, you can use the tagConversation() method. The tagConversation() method accepts three parameters.

1. conversationWith: UID/GUID of the user/group whose conversation you want to fetch.

2. conversationType: The conversationType variable can hold one of the below two values:

   1. user - Only fetches user conversation.
   2. group - Only fetches group conversations.

3. tags: The tags variable will be a list of tags you want to add to a conversation.

Tag Conversation

let tags = ["archivedChat"];

CometChat.tagConversation('conversationWith', 'conversationType', tags).then(
  conversation => {
      console.log('conversation', conversation);
  }, error => {
      console.log('error while fetching a conversation', error);
  }
);

The tags for conversations are one-way. This means that if user A tags a conversation with user B, that tag will be applied to that conversation only for user A.

Retrieve Single Conversation

In other words, as a logged-in user, how do I retrieve a specific conversation?

To fetch a specific conversation, you can use the getConversation method. The getConversation method accepts two parameters.

1. conversationWith: UID/GUID of the user/group whose conversation you want to fetch.
2. conversationType: The conversationType variable can hold one of the below two values:

• user - Only fetches user conversation.
• group - Only fetches group conversations.

Get Conversation

CometChat.getConversation('conversationWith', 'conversationType').then(
  conversation => {
    console.log('conversation', conversation);
  }, error => {
    console.log('error while fetching a conversation', error);
  }
);

Convert Messages to Conversations

As per our receive messages guide, for real-time messages, you will always receive Message objects and not Conversation objects. Thus, you will need a mechanism to convert the Message object to the Conversation object. You can use the getConversationFromMessage(BaseMessage message) of the CometChatHelper class.

Convert Message to Conversation

CometChat.CometChatHelper.getConversationFromMessage(message).then(
  conversation => {
    console.log("Conversation Object", conversation);
  }, error => {
    console.log("Error while converting message object", error);
  }
);

While converting the Message object to the Conversation object, the unreadMessageCount & tags will not be available in the Conversation object. The unread message count needs to be managed in your client-side code.