> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.cloudhumans.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.
# Create an article
> Create one article in the portal. It starts as `draft` — invisible on the public help center — unless the payload sends an explicit `status`; the usual flow is create as draft, review, then [publish by updating the status](/api-reference/cloudchat/endpoints/update-an-article).
Authorship is always the authenticated user behind the token. The article's locale is inherited from its category, or from the portal default when no `category_id` is sent. Requires being an administrator of the account or a member of the portal.
export const CloudChatYourValues = () => {
const STORAGE_KEY = "cloudchat-api-selected-account";
const CREDENTIALS_HREF = "/api-reference/cloudchat/credentials";
const [saved, setSaved] = useState(null);
const [ready, setReady] = useState(false);
useEffect(() => {
let value = null;
try {
const raw = window.localStorage.getItem(STORAGE_KEY);
if (raw) {
const parsed = JSON.parse(raw);
if (parsed && parsed.instance && parsed.account) {
value = {
instance: String(parsed.instance),
account: String(parsed.account),
name: typeof parsed.name === "string" && parsed.name ? parsed.name : null
};
}
}
} catch (error) {
value = null;
}
setSaved(value);
setReady(true);
}, []);
const shell = "not-prose rounded-xl border border-gray-200 dark:border-white/10 bg-gray-50 dark:bg-white/5 px-4 py-3 mb-6";
if (!ready || !saved) {
return
Every request below needs your cloudchat-instance header and your account
id.{" "}
Paste your token
{" "}
and they will show up here, ready to copy.
;
};
## OpenAPI
````yaml api-reference/specs/cloudchat/v1.json POST /v1/accounts/{accountId}/portals/{portalSlug}/articles
openapi: 3.0.1
info:
title: Cloud Chat API
version: v1
description: >-
The curated public surface of Cloud Chat. Every call needs two things: the
Bearer token from `POST /auth/v1/signin`, and the `cloudchat-instance`
header that says which Cloud Chat instance your company lives on.
If you don't know your instance value, the [Find your
credentials](/api-reference/cloudchat/credentials) page reads it out of your
own token in the browser.
servers:
- url: https://api.cloudhumans.com/cloudchat
description: Production
security:
- bearerAuth: []
tags:
- name: Canned Responses
description: >-
Canned responses — the shortcuts agents expand while replying. Each one
belongs to a single account and is identified by its short code.
- name: Conversations
description: >-
Read-only access to the conversations of an account. What you can see
follows the same rule as the dashboard: an administrator token sees every
inbox, an agent token only the inboxes it is a member of.
- name: Help Center
description: >-
Portals, categories and articles of the help center — the public FAQ your
customers read.
- name: Uploads
description: Store the images help center articles embed.
- name: Labels
description: >-
Read-only access to the labels an account has defined. A label is a tag
conversations and contacts carry; this endpoint only lists the label
definitions themselves.
- name: Inboxes
description: >-
Read-only access to the inboxes a token can see — every inbox of the
account for an administrator, only its memberships for an agent. Never
includes the channel's credentials.
- name: Agents
description: >-
Read-only access to the human and AI agents of an account. A hidden admin
(the platform's own support user) never appears, on the list or by id.
- name: Teams
description: >-
Teams group agents for assignment. Listing and reading are open to any
member; creating and updating a team, and managing its membership, require
an administrator token. A system-managed team (provisioned by the
platform) can be read like any other but never updated.
- name: Macros
description: >-
Macros bundle a sequence of actions an agent runs against a conversation
from the dashboard. This surface lets you list, read and write macro
definitions — running one is not part of the v1 contract. A macro is
either `global` (visible to the whole account) or `personal` (visible only
to its author); an agent token can only create personal macros.
- name: Automation Rules
description: >-
Read-only access to the account's automation rules — administrator only.
An agent token gets a 403 on every operation in this group.
- name: Availability Reasons
description: >-
The reasons an agent can go `busy` for, configured per account. Listing is
open to any member; creating, updating and deleting require an
administrator token. Deleting is a soft delete — the reason disappears
from listings but agents' past availability history keeps referencing it.
paths:
/v1/accounts/{accountId}/portals/{portalSlug}/articles:
post:
tags:
- Help Center
summary: Create an article
description: >-
Create one article in the portal. It starts as `draft` — invisible on
the public help center — unless the payload sends an explicit `status`;
the usual flow is create as draft, review, then [publish by updating the
status](/api-reference/cloudchat/endpoints/update-an-article).
Authorship is always the authenticated user behind the token. The
article's locale is inherited from its category, or from the portal
default when no `category_id` is sent. Requires being an administrator
of the account or a member of the portal.
operationId: createHelpCenterArticle
parameters:
- $ref: '#/components/parameters/AccountId'
- $ref: '#/components/parameters/CloudChatInstance'
- $ref: '#/components/parameters/PortalSlug'
requestBody:
required: true
content:
application/json:
schema:
$ref: '#/components/schemas/ArticleCreateRequest'
example:
article:
title: How to reset your password
content: Open **Settings → Security** and click *Reset password*.
category_id: 12
responses:
'201':
description: The article as stored.
content:
application/json:
schema:
$ref: '#/components/schemas/Article'
example:
id: 118
title: How to reset your password
slug: how-to-reset-your-password
content: Open **Settings → Security** and click *Reset password*.
description: Self-service password reset, step by step.
status: draft
locale: en
category_id: 12
associated_article_id: null
author_id: 7
portal_slug: acme-help
public_url: >-
https://help.acme.com/hc/acme-help/articles/how-to-reset-your-password
created_at: '2026-08-10T14:32:05.123Z'
updated_at: '2026-08-10T14:32:05.123Z'
'400':
$ref: '#/components/responses/BadRequest'
'401':
$ref: '#/components/responses/Unauthorized'
'403':
description: >-
Two situations answer with this code: the account is suspended (the
reason the other endpoints share), or — on every article endpoint,
listing included — your user is neither an administrator of the
account nor a member of this portal. Ask an administrator to add you
to the portal's members.
content:
application/json:
schema:
$ref: '#/components/schemas/Error'
example:
error:
code: forbidden
message: You are not allowed to perform this action.
'404':
$ref: '#/components/responses/NotFound'
'422':
description: >-
The payload was understood but a value is not acceptable — a missing
`title` or `content`, a `status` outside
`draft`/`published`/`archived`, or a
`category_id`/`associated_article_id` that belongs to another
portal. `details` names each offending field.
content:
application/json:
schema:
$ref: '#/components/schemas/ValidationError'
example:
error:
code: validation_failed
message: The request payload is invalid.
details:
- field: category_id
code: invalid
message: The category does not belong to this portal.
'429':
$ref: '#/components/responses/TooManyRequests'
'500':
$ref: '#/components/responses/InternalError'
components:
parameters:
AccountId:
name: accountId
in: path
required: true
description: >-
Your Cloud Chat account. It has to be an account your token grants
membership on, and it has to live on the instance in the
`cloudchat-instance` header — the two travel together. Account numbers
are only unique **within** an instance, so the same number is a
different company on another instance. Usually a mismatched pair fails
closed with a 401, because your user does not exist on the other
instance — but if your identity happens to exist on both, the call
succeeds against the other company's data, silently. Read it and you are
looking at the wrong help center; write it and you have stored into the
wrong account. Send the two values that were given to you together, and
never try a number to see what answers.
schema:
type: integer
example: 1
CloudChatInstance:
name: cloudchat-instance
in: header
required: true
description: >-
Your Cloud Chat instance ID — an integer, fixed for your company, told
at onboarding. [The API
overview](/api-reference/cloudchat/overview#two-headers-every-call)
explains how instances work, how to find yours, and the errors a wrong
or missing value produces.
schema:
type: integer
example: 1
PortalSlug:
name: portalSlug
in: path
required: true
description: >-
The portal's slug — the URL-safe handle you see in its public address
(`/hc//...`), not a numeric id. [List
portals](/api-reference/cloudchat/endpoints/list-portals) returns every
slug on the account. Note the asymmetry: portals are addressed by slug,
articles by numeric id.
schema:
type: string
example: acme-help
schemas:
ArticleCreateRequest:
type: object
description: >-
The article goes under an `article` wrapper. The author is never part of
the payload — it is always the authenticated user.
required:
- article
properties:
article:
type: object
required:
- title
- content
properties:
title:
type: string
example: How to reset your password
content:
type: string
example: Open **Settings → Security** and click *Reset password*.
description: >-
Markdown. To embed an image, [upload
it](/api-reference/cloudchat/endpoints/upload-an-image) first
and reference the returned `file_url`.
description:
type: string
example: Self-service password reset, step by step.
description: Short summary shown in listings and search results.
status:
type: string
enum:
- draft
- published
- archived
description: >-
Omit to keep the safe default — `draft` on create, unchanged on
update. `published` goes live on the public help center
immediately.
category_id:
type: integer
example: 12
description: >-
Must belong to the same portal — a category of another portal is
refused as `validation_failed`. Also decides the article's
locale and translation target.
associated_article_id:
type: integer
example: 97
description: >-
Link this article as a translation of an existing one. Must
belong to the same portal; any article of the family works, the
server normalizes to the root.
Article:
type: object
description: A help center article, drafts included.
required:
- id
- title
- slug
- content
- status
- locale
- author_id
- portal_slug
- public_url
- created_at
- updated_at
properties:
id:
type: integer
example: 118
description: What the single-article endpoints take as `articleId`.
title:
type: string
example: How to reset your password
slug:
type: string
example: how-to-reset-your-password
description: URL-safe handle generated from the title; forms the public URL.
content:
type: string
description: >-
The body, in Markdown. Images are ordinary Markdown image links —
[upload the
file](/api-reference/cloudchat/endpoints/upload-an-image) and embed
the returned `file_url`.
description:
type: string
nullable: true
description: Short summary shown in listings and search results.
status:
type: string
enum:
- draft
- published
- archived
example: draft
description: >-
Only `published` articles appear on the public help center. New
articles start as `draft` unless created with an explicit status.
locale:
type: string
example: en
description: >-
Inherited at creation from the category (or the portal default when
there is none). Not directly writable — move the article to a
category of the right locale instead.
category_id:
type: integer
nullable: true
example: 12
description: >-
Category the article is filed under. Decides where it renders — and
its locale.
associated_article_id:
type: integer
nullable: true
example: null
description: >-
Root article linking the translations of the same article across
locales. When writing, any article of the family is accepted — the
server normalizes it to the root.
author_id:
type: integer
nullable: true
example: 7
description: >-
Always the authenticated user behind the token. There is no way to
write an article as someone else. Null when the author was deleted:
the account keeps the article and drops the reference, so an orphan
article still reads normally with no author to show.
portal_slug:
type: string
example: acme-help
public_url:
type: string
example: >-
https://help.acme.com/hc/acme-help/articles/how-to-reset-your-password
description: >-
Where the article is served once `published` — on the portal's
custom domain when one is configured, on the default help center
host otherwise.
created_at:
type: string
format: date-time
example: '2026-08-10T14:32:05.123Z'
updated_at:
type: string
format: date-time
example: '2026-08-10T14:32:05.123Z'
Error:
type: object
description: The error envelope every Cloud Chat API response uses.
required:
- error
properties:
error:
type: object
required:
- code
- message
properties:
code:
type: string
description: >-
The stable, machine-readable reason. Branch on this, never on
`message`.
enum:
- unauthorized
- forbidden
- not_found
- validation_failed
- bad_request
- internal_error
example: not_found
message:
type: string
description: >-
The reason in words, localized to your account's language
(English, Spanish or Brazilian Portuguese; English when the
account is set to anything else). Wording changes with the
account and between releases, so never match on it.
Two cases stay in English whatever the account is set to:
`unauthorized`, decided before any account is known, and the
account-level `not_found`, which must not reveal the account's
language.
example: Resource could not be found.
details:
type: array
description: >-
Present on some rejections — a 400 for a refused query parameter
or upload mode, for example. One entry per offending field,
localized to the account's language like `message` — match on
`code` and `field`, never on the text.
items:
type: object
required:
- field
- code
- message
properties:
field:
type: string
description: Which request field the rule was about.
code:
type: string
description: Stable, machine-readable reason.
message:
type: string
description: The rule in words.
ValidationError:
type: object
description: A `validation_failed` error, which carries `details`.
required:
- error
properties:
error:
type: object
required:
- code
- message
- details
properties:
code:
type: string
enum:
- validation_failed
example: validation_failed
message:
type: string
description: >-
Localized to the account's language, like every other envelope
message.
example: The request payload is invalid.
details:
type: array
description: >-
One entry per rejected field. Unlike the envelope message above,
the texts come from the model layer and are in English in
practice (the model layer ships no translations) — match on code
and field, never on the text.
items:
type: object
required:
- field
- code
- message
properties:
field:
type: string
description: >-
Which request field the rule was about — `short_code` or
`content`. A rule that is not tied to either is reported
as `base`, so treat `base` as "the payload as a whole"
rather than a field you can highlight.
enum:
- short_code
- content
- base
example: short_code
code:
type: string
description: >-
Which rule it broke — `blank` for a missing or empty
value, `taken` for a `short_code` already used on the
account.
example: taken
message:
type: string
example: has already been taken
GatewayError:
type: object
description: >-
Rejected by the gateway before Cloud Chat saw it, so it does not use the
`error` envelope.
required:
- message
properties:
message:
type: string
example: API rate limit exceeded
request_id:
type: string
description: Gateway request id. Quote it when reporting a problem.
example: f3f7567638d4b65a8003057d0c77d275
responses:
BadRequest:
description: >-
The request itself is malformed, before any value is validated:
- a body that isn't valid JSON, or one with no `canned_response`
wrapper,
- a `canned_response` that isn't an object (`{"canned_response":
"text"}`),
- `page`, `per_page`, `search` or `sort` sent as an array or a nested
object (`?page[]=1`, `?sort[x]=y`) instead of a plain value,
- **the `cloudchat-instance` header missing or holding a value we don't
route,**
- an `accountId` that is not a number — including the literal
`{accountId}` that some API clients send when the argument is left
unset. This one answers with the normal envelope and `error.details`
naming `accountId`, and it is deliberately **not** a 404: a 404 would
mean the account cannot be reached, while this means the value was never
an account id at all, so re-read the argument instead of trying other
numbers.
**Two different shapes answer with 400, and the difference will bite you
on day one.** That last case is rejected before the request reaches the
API, so `error` is a plain **string** instead of the usual object:
```json
{ "error": "" }
```
Every other 400 uses the normal envelope, where `error` is an object
with `code` and `message`. Reading `error.code` without checking the
type first throws on the missing-header case — which is the most likely
400 of your first integration. Check `typeof error === "string"` first,
or read `error?.code` defensively.
A 400 always means fix the request shape; it never means a value was
rejected. Rejected values are 422.
content:
application/json:
schema:
$ref: '#/components/schemas/Error'
example:
error:
code: bad_request
message: The request is malformed.
Unauthorized:
description: >-
No Bearer token, or one that is expired, malformed, or not a Cognito
token. Sign in again for a fresh `id_token`.
content:
application/json:
schema:
$ref: '#/components/schemas/Error'
example:
error:
code: unauthorized
message: >-
Authentication is required. Send a valid Bearer token in the
Authorization header.
NotFound:
description: >-
The resource is not there for you. Three situations answer with this
code, and the first two apply to **every** endpoint — the account is
resolved before anything else runs, so a list or a create fails this way
too:
- the account does not exist on this instance,
- the account exists but your token has no membership on it,
- on an endpoint that names one, the resource it names (a canned
response, a portal, an article) does not exist where the path says it
does.
The first two are deliberately indistinguishable — same status, same
body, and the message stays in English in both, since translating it
would reveal the account's configured language. So you cannot use this
endpoint to find out which account ids exist. The third case is
localized like every other error, which is safe because you only reach
it once membership is established.
Either way a 404 is not worth retrying. Check the `accountId`, the
`cloudchat-instance` value, and that your user is a member of the
account.
content:
application/json:
schema:
$ref: '#/components/schemas/Error'
example:
error:
code: not_found
message: Resource could not be found.
TooManyRequests:
description: >-
Rate limited per source IP. Note the envelope: this one is `{ "message":
... }`, because the request never reached the API.
Don't hardcode the limit — read it from the response. `Retry-After` says
how many seconds to wait, and every response (not just this one) carries
`ratelimit-limit`, `ratelimit-remaining` and `ratelimit-reset`, the last
in seconds.
content:
application/json:
schema:
$ref: '#/components/schemas/GatewayError'
example:
message: API rate limit exceeded
InternalError:
description: >-
Something failed on our side. The response never carries the underlying
error, but it is reported to our monitoring automatically — no need to
file anything for a one-off.
Retrying is reasonable, with one caveat on `POST`: a 500 does not prove
the write did not happen, so a retry can come back `422` with
`short_code` already taken. That 422 means the first attempt succeeded —
list the account and confirm before treating it as a failure.
content:
application/json:
schema:
$ref: '#/components/schemas/Error'
example:
error:
code: internal_error
message: An unexpected error occurred. Please try again later.
securitySchemes:
bearerAuth:
type: http
scheme: bearer
bearerFormat: JWT
description: >-
The `id_token` from `POST /auth/v1/signin`, sent as `Authorization:
Bearer `. Not the `access_token` — that one does not carry the
identity Cloud Chat authorizes on.
````