Your first Zid app: from partner account to a tested install

Start with a partner account

Everything you build on Zid lives in the Partner Dashboard: your apps and themes, your development stores, installs and subscriptions, and your submissions for review.

To register, open the Zid developer portal, click Sign Up and fill in the form:

• Full name: use your company name. It's publicly visible and shows as the app developer name.
• Email: a fresh address that isn't linked to any Zid store.
• Mobile: must be a GCC number.
• Password: at least 8 characters, mixing letters and numbers.
• Your country, your role (employee or freelancer) and whether you're building a public or private app.

Create your draft app

1. In the Partner Dashboard, open My Apps and click Create Application, then choose a public or private application.
2. Fill in what merchants will see: the app name in Arabic and English, up to 3 categories, supported languages and a maintainer email.
3. Click Create Application. Your app is saved as a draft that you can keep editing at any time.

Zid then takes you to the app details page, where the real configuration happens.

Get your credentials, scopes and links

Open General Settings. The App Keys section holds the three values you need for OAuth:

• OAuth 2.0 End-Point: the authorization URL for handling OAuth requests.
• Client ID: your app's unique identifier.
• Client Secret: the secret key that authenticates your app.

Next, select the scopes your app needs. Scopes decide which store features your app can reach, so justify each one clearly. The review team checks them. For an app that opens inside the merchant dashboard, select the embedded apps scope before turning on the embed option.

Then add your app links:

• Application URL: where your app is hosted and accessed by merchants.
• Redirection URL: where merchants land after installing. For embedded apps, this URL handles the OAuth flow before sending the merchant to the embedded app.
• Callback URL: the URL Zid and your app use to talk to each other during OAuth.

Finish the listing with a description, developer details, a video (as an embedded YouTube URL), screenshots and an icon.

Set up a development store

A development store is a private store for testing apps and themes before they go public. It behaves like a real merchant store, so you can install your app as a store owner would and catch bugs early.

1. In the Partner Dashboard, open Development Stores from the sidebar.
2. Click Create Store. Zid creates the store and gives it a store URL.
3. Click Dashboard Access next to the store to log in to its merchant dashboard.

You can create more than one development store, so you can keep test scenarios apart.

A new store has no data, so add some before you test:

• Products: import them in bulk or add them one at a time.
• Customers: add a few from the Customers page.
• Orders: create orders from the Orders page.
• Payments: bank transfer, or cash on delivery (which needs a custom shipping option). Card payments aren't required; if you need them, ask support in chat.

Test the install flow end to end

1. Open your app in My Apps, go to Application Details and click Install on my development store.
2. In the development store, open the App Market and scroll down to your store's private applications section. Your app appears there.
3. Activate it from the App Market. The OAuth screen should appear, and when it completes the app should be active.
4. Subscribe to a plan and check that the plan details reach your system.
5. Try your main features and confirm that data stays in sync between Zid and your system.

If OAuth fails, the help centre suggests two checks. For an OAuth authorization server error, confirm your redirection and callback URLs. An internal server error comes from your own server's response during the redirect step, so check your logs.

Before you submit for review

Add at least one pricing plan (up to four), recurring or usage-based. Then check that you have:

• Signed a partnership agreement.
• Tested the app on a development store, with every feature working.
• Test accounts and login details for your platform ready.
• QA test cases prepared to help with validation.
• Merchant activation steps, setup requirements and FAQs written up.

After you submit, you'll be notified of the review status and estimated publish date.