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    Group System

    Last updated: 2024-04-18 15:57:59
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      Group System Overview

      The group system is an instant messaging system that allows multiple participants to communicate in one chat. The group system has the following basic capabilities:
      Comprehensive group management capabilities: group creation and disbanding, member management, group profile management, member profile management, and more.
      Stable and reliable messaging and a sophisticated group message management mechanism: permission control, muting/unmuting, message callback, message roaming, and more.
      Based on common use cases, IM provides the following default group types: work group (Work), public group (Public), meeting group (Meeting), audio-video group (AVChatRoom), and Community group (Community).
      Upper limit on the number of group members:
      The number of members in a Work, Public, or Meeting group can be increased to a maximum of 6,000 if fees are paid. For more information, see Pricing.
      A community group (Community) supports up to 100,000 members per group.
      There is no upper limit on the number of members in an audio-video group (AVChatRoom).
      Caution
      Although audio-video groups (AVChatRoom) support unlimited group members, if a spike in group members is expected within a short time (in scenarios such as large online events where the number of members in a single group reaches 50,000 or above), contact the channel manager in advance and report service resource usage by providing the SDKAppID and the scheduled event time.
      Currently, historical message storage is available only for non-audio-video groups, with messages stored for 7 days for billing plans of the Developer edition and Standard edition and 30 days for the Premium edition by default. If you require a longer storage period, change the storage period of historical messages in the console. Increasing the storage period of historical messages is a value-added service. For more information on pricing, see Pricing.
      Community is a new powerful tool for entertainment collaboration. Within the same community, a high number of members can be divided into different groups and topics to separate messages for hierarchical communication, yet they can also share the same set of friend relationships. This helps you develop a unique path of social expansion. The community feature is widely suitable for diverse use cases, such as finding like-minded people, game-based social networking, fan marketing, and organization management.
      The community feature is supported by the SDK of the Enhanced edition on v5.8.1668 or later and the SDK for web on v2.17.0 or later. You need to purchase the Premium edition, go to the console, select Group feature configuration, and enable Community.
      IM's group system is highly customizable, allowing you to use:
      Custom message elements
      Custom group IDs
      Custom topic IDs
      Custom fields
      Custom callbacks

      Group Member Roles

      The following table lists various group member roles and their permissions:
      Group Member Role
      Description
      Management Permission
      Ordinary member
      An ordinary member has no management permissions.
      In a work group (Work), an ordinary member has the permission to modify the group profile.
      Admin
      An admin is appointed by the group owner to assist in managing group members and holds certain management permissions.
      Modify the group profile
      Remove an ordinary member from the group
      Mute an ordinary member, that is, prevent the ordinary member from speaking for a certain period of time
      Approve or reject a membership application
      Work groups do not support the setting of admins by default.
      Group owner
      A group owner is the creator of a group and has the highest level of management permissions in the group.
      The group owner has the following permissions in addition to all permissions held by an admin:
      Appoint or cancel an admin
      Remove an admin from the group
      Mute an admin
      Disband the group
      Transfer the group
      App admin
      This special role has the authority to manage all group permissions in the app and has more power than the group owner.
      The app admin has the same permissions as the group owner, whether it is a member of the group or not.
      

      Group Types

      Based on common use cases, IM provides the following default group types:
      Group Type
      Applicable Scenario
      Work group (Work)
      After a work group is created, users can join the group only after being invited by group members. The invitation does not need to be accepted by the invitee or approved by the group owner. This group type is the same as private group (Private) in earlier versions.
      Public group (Public)
      After a public group is created, the group owner can designate group admins. To join the group, a user needs to search for the group ID and send a request, and the request needs to be approved by the group owner or an admin before the user can join the group.
      Meeting group (Meeting)
      A meeting group allows users to join and leave freely and view historical messages sent before they join the group. Meeting groups are ideal for scenarios that integrate Tencent Real-Time Communication (TRTC), such as audio/video conferencing and online education. This group type is the same as chat room (ChatRoom) in earlier versions.
      Audio-video group (AVChatRoom)
      An audio-video group allows users to join and exit freely, supports an unlimited number of members, and does not store message history. Audio-video groups can be used with Cloud Streaming Services (CSS) to support on-screen comment chat scenarios.
      Community group (Community)
      A community group allows users to join and exit freely, supports up to 100,000 members, and stores message history. To join the group, a user needs to search for the group ID and send an application, and the application does not need to be approved by an admin before the user can join the group.

      Differences in basic group capabilities

      Item
      Work Group
      Public Group
      Meeting Group
      Audio-Video Group
      Community Group
      Available member roles
      Group owner
      Ordinary member
      Application admin
      Group owner
      Admin
      Ordinary member
      App admin
      Group owner
      Admin
      Ordinary member
      App admin
      Group owner
      App admin
      Group owner
      Admin
      Ordinary member
      App admin
      Permission to modify basic group information
      Ordinary member
      Group owner
      Application admin
      Group admin
      Group owner
      App admin
      Group owner
      App admin
      Group owner
      App admin
      Admin
      Group owner
      App admin
      Number of group members whose information can be obtained
      All group members
      All group members
      All group members
      None (no group member information stored)
      All group members
      Who can disband a group
      App admin
      Group owner and app admin
      Group owner and app admin
      Group owner and app admin
      Group owner and app admin
      Note
      Group types are upgraded in the new SDK version and they are work group (Work), public group (Public), meeting group (Meeting), audio-video group (AVChatRoom), and Community group (Community). Private group (Private) and chat room (ChatRoom) in earlier versions (which have Public, Private, ChatRoom, and AVChatRoom groups) correspond to work group (Work) and meeting group (Meeting) in the new version respectively.
      Ordinary members of a work group (Work) can modify only the group name, introduction, announcement, and group profile photo URL, but not other group profile information.
      If the roles of a group type cannot meet your business needs, you can add roles by setting member-level custom fields.
      It is necessary to obtain the information about some members in scenarios where an audio-video group displays a list of some of its members.

      Differences in joining a group

      Item
      Work Group
      Public Group
      Meeting Group
      Audio-Video Group
      Community Group
      Perform an exact search for a group ID to join a group
      Not supported
      Supported
      Supported
      Supported
      Supported
      Perform a fuzzy search for group information to join a group
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Apply to join a group
      Not supported
      Supported. Approval from the group owner or admin is needed.
      Supported. No approval is needed.
      Supported. No approval is needed.
      Supported. No approval is needed.
      Join a group after receiving an invitation from a group member
      Supported
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Supported
      Note
      Exact search is to search for a group by group ID. Fuzzy search is to search for a group by fields such as the group name.
      Approval for joining a group: the group owner and admin can choose to approve or reject applications made by non-members to join the group. Only approved users can join the group.
      For a group type that does not support the invitation of non-members to a group, group members can share the group ID with non-members in the app so that the non-members can join the group.

      Differences in member management capabilities

      Item
      Work Group
      Public Group
      Meeting Group
      Audio-Video Group
      Community Group
      Setting admins
      Not supported
      Supported
      Supported
      Supported
      Supported
      A group owner quits the group
      Supported. After the group owner quits, the group has no group owner.
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Remove a group member
      Supported. The group owner can remove group members.
      Supported. The group owner and admin can remove group members, but the admin can remove only ordinary group members.
      Supported. The group owner and admin can remove group members, but the admin can remove only ordinary group members.
      Not supported. The muting feature can be used to achieve a similar effect.
      Supported. The group owner and admin can remove group members, but the admin can remove only ordinary group members.
      Mute a group member
      Not supported
      Supported. The group owner and admin can mute group members, but the admin can mute only ordinary group members.
      Supported. The group owner and admin can mute group members, but the admin can mute only ordinary group members.
      Supported. The group owner can mute group members.
      Supported. The group owner and admin can mute group members, but the admin can mute only ordinary group members.
      Periodically remove offline group members
      Supported, but disabled by default
      Supported, but disabled by default
      Supported, but disabled by default
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Caution
      Muted group members cannot send group chat messages within the mute period.

      Differences in group limits

      Item
      Work Group/Public Group/Meeting Group
      Audio-Video Group
      Community Group
      Maximum number of members
      Developer edition: 20 per group
      Standard edition: 200 members/group by default, which can be extended to 2,000 members/group through a value-added service
      Premium edition: 2,000 members/group by default, which can be extended to 6,000 members/group through a value-added service.
      Unlimited
      Developer edition: not supported
      Standard edition: not supported
      Premium edition: 100,000 members/group by default
      Maximum number of groups
      Developer edition: up to 100 existing groups, and disbanded groups do not count against the quota
      Standard edition or Premium edition: unlimited
      Developer edition: up to 10 existing groups, and disbanded groups do not count against the quota
      Standard edition: up to 50 existing groups, and disbanded groups do not count against the quota. You can upgrade to an unlimited number of audio-video groups by purchasing the value-added service.
      Premium edition: unlimited
      Developer edition: not supported
      Standard edition: not supported
      Premium edition: 100,000 groups can be created by default
      Caution
      In the Standard edition or Premium edition SDKAppID, the maximum net increase in group count per day (the number of created groups minus the number of disbanded groups) is 10,000 for all group types.
      In the Standard edition or Premium edition SDKAppID, the free peak group count is 100,000 per month, and you will need to pay fees for exceeding the quota in a plan. It is recommend that you disband the groups that are no longer needed in a timely manner.

      Differences in message capabilities

      Item
      Work Group
      Public Group
      Meeting Group
      Audio-Video Group
      Community Group
      Unread message count
      Supported
      Supported
      Not supported
      Not supported
      Supported
      Historical message storage
      Supported
      Supported
      Supported
      Not supported
      Supported
      Viewing roaming messages from before a user joins the group
      It is disabled by default and can be configured in the console.
      It is disabled by default and can be configured in the console.
      It is disabled by default and can be configured in the console.
      Not supported
      It is enabled by default and can be configured in the console.
      Notification of group member change
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when a user is invited to a group, asks other users to join a group, is kicked out of a group, or leaves a group. This feature can be configured in the console.
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when a user is invited to a group, asks other users to join a group, is kicked out of a group, or leaves a group. This feature can be configured in the console.
      A notification is disabled by default when a user is invited to a group, asks other users to join a group, is kicked out of a group, or leaves a group. This feature can be configured in the console.
      A notification will be pushed but not stored on the roaming server when a user is invited to a group, asks other users to join a group, is kicked out of a group, or leaves a group.
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when a user is invited to a group, asks other users to join a group, is kicked out of a group, or leaves a group. This feature can be configured in the console.
      Notification of group profile change
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when the group name, group notifications, group introduction, group profile photo, or group owner is changed, and a notification is disabled by default when group muting or the group joining mode is changed. Both can be configured in the console.
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when the group name, group notifications, group introduction, group profile photo, or group owner is changed, and a notification is disabled by default when group muting or the group joining mode is changed. Both can be configured in the console.
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when the group name, group notifications, group introduction, group profile photo, or group owner is changed, and a notification is disabled by default when group muting or the group joining mode is changed. Both can be configured in the console.
      A notification will be pushed but not stored on the roaming server when the group name, group notifications, group introduction, group profile photo, or group owner is changed, and a notification is disabled when group muting or the group joining mode is changed.
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when the group name, group notifications, group introduction, group profile photo, or group owner is changed, and a notification is disabled by default when group muting or the group joining mode is changed. Both can be configured in the console. The community joining mode cannot be changed, so no notification will be pushed.
      Notification of group member profile change
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when the group muting or group admin is changed. This feature can be configured in the console.
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when the group muting or group admin is changed. This feature can be configured in the console.
      A notification is disabled by default when the group muting or group admin is changed. This feature can be configured in the console.
      A notification will be disabled by default when the group muting or group admin is changed. This feature can be configured in the console.
      A notification will be pushed and stored on the roaming server by default when the group muting or group admin is changed. This feature can be configured in the console.
      A message must be sent to activate a new group
      Required
      Not required
      Not required
      Not required
      Not required
      Default message receiving option
      Receive online and offline push messages
      Receive online and offline push messages
      Receive only online push messages
      Receive only online push messages
      Receive online and offline push messages
      Caution
      For a group that requires activation, before the group owner sends a message, the group is inactive and invisible to all group members except the group owner. A group that does not require activation is visible to all group members once it is created.
      Currently, offline push is available only on Android (Android offline push) and iOS (APNs push) platforms.
      The work group, public group, meeting group, and community group have the historical message storage capability, which allows historical messages to be stored for 7 days (30 days for the Premium edition) free of charge by default. If you need a longer storage period, change the storage period of historical messages in the console. Increasing the storage period of historical messages is a value-added service. For more information on pricing, see Pricing.

      Differences in batch import and automatic repossession

      Item
      Work Group/Public Group/Meeting Group/Community Group
      Audio-Video Group
      Importing groups, group members, and group messages is allowed
      Yes. It is allowed when historical groups are migrated from a third-party platform to IM.
      No. Only existing groups, group members, and group messages can be used.
      Time before a group is automatically repossessed (in seconds)
      The backend does not repossess groups, unless the group owner disbands the group or all members quit the group. (About group disbanding: the backend does not proactively disband a group unless the group owner disbands the group or the group is automatically repossessed. If automatic repossession is configured for a group, the backend irregularly traverses the group and disbands it if no one sends a message in the group for n seconds or the group profile is modified.)
      The backend does not repossess groups, unless the group owner disbands the group or all members quit the group.

      Group Data Structure

      Group basic information

      Field Name
      Type
      Description
      Notes
      GroupId
      String
      Unique identifier of the group
      Read-only.
      Each group ID must be unique in the app. The prefix is @TGS#, and custom group IDs can also be used in the app.
      Type
      String
      Group type
      Read-only.
      The following group types are supported by default: work group, public group, meeting group, audio-video group, and community group. For more information, see Group Types.
      In the SDK of an earlier version, group types also include the private group, ChatRoom, and BChatRoom, which are not recommended.
      Name
      String
      Name of the group
      Readable and writable. The maximum length is 30 bytes and cannot be adjusted.
      Introduction
      String
      Introduction of the group
      Readable and writable. The maximum length is 240 bytes and cannot be adjusted.
      Notification
      String
      Group announcement
      Readable and writable. The maximum length is 300 bytes and cannot be adjusted.
      FaceUrl
      String
      URL of the group's profile photo
      Readable and writable. The maximum length is 100 bytes and cannot be adjusted.
      Owner_Account
      String
      ID of the group owner
      Read-only.
      CreateTime
      Integer
      Creation time of the group
      Read-only.
      InfoSeq
      Integer
      This value increases every time the group information changes.
      Read-only.
      LastInfoTime
      Integer
      Time of the last change to group information
      Read-only.
      LastMsgTime
      Integer
      Time of the last message in the group chat
      Read-only.
      NextMsgSeq
      Integer
      Seq of the next message in the group chat
      Read-only.
      Every message in the group chat has a unique Seq, and the Seq values are consecutive numbers based on the sequence of sent messages. With every message sent to the group chat, NextMsgSeq (starting from 1) increases by 1 (by default, system messages such as notifications of group join or leaving are messages and can cause NextMsgSeq to increase by 1).
      MemberNum
      Integer
      Number of current members
      Read-only.
      MaxMemberNum
      Integer
      Maximum number of members
      Default value: The upper limit of the paid plan; for example, it is 20 on Developer edition. If you upgrade the plan, you need to modify this field to the corresponding value according to the basic information of the modified group.
      ApplyJoinOption
      String
      Membership application option
      The following options are available:
      DisableApply: disallow any application.
      NeedPermission: group owner or admin's approval is required.
      FreeAccess: users can join the group freely without prior approval.
      Caution
      The permissions to modify the group name, introduction, announcement, and profile photo URL are described as follows:
      In a work group, any member can modify them.
      For other group types, only non-ordinary members can modify them.

      Group member profile

      Field Name
      Type
      Description
      Notes
      Member_Account
      String
      Group member ID
      Read-only.
      Role
      String
      Role in the group
      A group has the following roles: Owner (group owner), Admin (group admin), and Member (group member).
      JoinTime
      Integer
      Time of joining the group
      Read-only.
      MsgSeq
      Integer
      Sequence number of the current read message of the member
      Read-only.
      MsgFlag
      String
      Message receiving option
      The following options are available:
      AcceptAndNotify: receive and notify.
      AcceptNotNotify: receive without notifying (remote APNs push is not triggered)
      Discard: block group messages (messages are not pushed to clients)
      LastSendMsgTime
      Integer
      Time of sending the last message
      Supported by work groups, public groups, and meeting groups, but not audio-video groups.
      NameCard
      String
      Group name card
      Readable and writable. It can contain up to 50 bytes and cannot be adjusted.
      MuteUntil
      Integer
      Muting status
      If it is 0, the group member is not muted; otherwise, it indicates the muting stop timestamp.

      Custom Group IDs

      When a group is created in the app, IM assigns a default group ID to the new group by default. This default group ID starts with @TGS# and is unique in the app. IM also allows you to customize group IDs that are simple and easy to remember and communicate. A custom group ID must be a string of ASCII characters (0x20-0x7e) with a length less than 48 bytes. Do not use @TGS# as the prefix to avoid confusion with assigned group IDs.
      Caution
      The prefix of the IDs of community groups (Community) must be @TGS#_.
      

      Custom Topic IDs

      When a topic is created in the app, IM assigns a default topic ID to the new topic by default. The ID starts with GroupId+@TOPIC#_ and is unique in the group.
      To make it easier to remember and communicate the topic ID, IM allows customizing it in the format of GroupId+@TOPIC#_+ custom part during topic creation through the RESTful API in the application. The custom part cannot contain @TGS#_ and @TOPIC#_@TOPIC# (to avoid confusion with the default group ID) and must consist of printable ASCII characters (0x20-0x7e).
      For example, if GroupId is @TGS#_@TGS#cQVLVHIM62CJ, and the custom part is TestTopic, the custom topic ID will be @TGS#_@TGS#cQVLVHIM62CJ@TOPIC#_TestTopic. The entire custom topic ID must be no longer than 96 bytes.

      Custom Fields

      IM allows you to configure up to 10 group-level custom fields and 5 member-level custom fields based on your business needs. With custom fields, apps can attach additional data to groups, and the data can be read and written through existing APIs.

      Description

      Custom fields have the following characteristics:
      Their values are expressed in key-value format.
      Key is a string with a length less than 16 bytes. Its name contains only uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and underscores (_).
      Value is a buffer customized by the user, which can be binary data. Group-level values have a maximum length of 512 bytes, while member-level values have a maximum length of 64 bytes.
      You can configure the least read permission and the least write permission for each key.
      The read and write permissions of a custom field are listed as follows, from high to low:
      1. Readable and writable by the app admin.
      2. Readable and writable by the group owner.
      3. Readable and writable by the group admin.
      4. Readable and writable by group members.
      5. Readable and writable by anyone, including non-members.
      For example, an app needs to extend the GroupLevel field for groups and the value of this field is a number representing the level of a group. If this level information is calculated by the app backend, then the least write permission should be writable by the app admin. If the field is part of the public profile of the group, its least read permission should be readable by anyone, including non-members.
      If the value to be stored is a number, we recommend that C and C++ developers store it as a string instead of binary data. For example, when the number to be stored is 1, store it as string 1 instead of binary data 0x01. In the future, IM will offer more operations for custom fields, such as specific mathematical operations on values, which will be performed on the basis of string-type numbers.

      Configuration

      Custom fields at these two levels can be configured in the IM console. To configure member-level custom fields, you need to specify the group type first. Audio-video group and custom group types that are configured based on it do not support custom fields at the group member level, because these types of groups do not store member profiles. The self read and write permissions indicate whether members can read and write their own member-level custom fields. For example, a member-level customer field named MemberLevel represents the level of a member in a group. Group members can read but not modify their own levels, and therefore their self read and write permissions are set to readable/unwritable for this field.
      Caution
      Configured custom fields cannot be deleted or modified. Proceed with caution.

      Custom Callbacks

      Third-party callback is an important means to meet the special requirements of apps. It provides users with the capability to customize actions. IM's group system supports different callbacks. For more information, see Third-Party Callback Overview and Callback Command List.
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