Connecting Amazon S3 as an external knowledge source

You can set up an Amazon S3 connection to connect and sync content from your Amazon S3 bucket. After you connect an S3 bucket, you canconfigure workflows to use this external content.


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Summary: ◀▼
You can connect Amazon S3 to sync .docx, .xlsx, and .md files as external knowledge sources. Manage content by adding or removing files in your S3 bucket, set viewer permissions for user segments, and manually resync or remove connections. Syncs update every 24 hours but can be triggered anytime. This integration helps you keep external content accessible within your workflows and knowledge base.




You can connect Amazon S3 to your Zendesk account to make content available wherever external content is used. You must be
a Knowledge admin to set up and manage external content connections.
Note: Amazon S3 connections currently support .docx, .xlsx, and .md
file types.

This article contains the following topics:
Setting up an Amazon S3 connection
Adding or removing content from your Amazon S3 connection
Managing content connected to your Zendesk account



Related articles:
About connecting external content to Zendesk
for use across knowledge experiences
Knowledge product limits for your help
center




Setting up an Amazon S3 connection

You can set up an Amazon S3 connection to connect and sync content from your Amazon
S3 bucket. After you connect an S3 bucket, you can configure workflows to use this external
content.

To set up an Amazon S3 connection
In Knowledge admin, click Manage articles
( ) in the sidebar.
Click External content > Connections.
Under the Available sources section, click Connect on the Amazon S3
card.
Click Continue.

On the Authenticate (Step 1 of 2) page, enter the following:

Access Key ID and Secret Access Key: AWS IAM
credentials that grant programmatic access to the Amazon S3 bucket
you want to sync. AWS access keys are generated through the AWS
Identity and Access Management (IAM) console. See AWS Developer Guide for
more information.

AWS Region: AWS region where your bucket is stored.



On the Authenticate (Step 2 of 2) page, enter the name of the Amazon
S3 bucket that you want to sync. The connector will sync all supported file
types (.docx, .xlsx, and .md), folders, and subfolders within a
bucket.






Adding or removing content from your Amazon S3 connection

To add or remove content from an Amazon S3 connection, you can add or delete the
content from the connected S3 bucket, then either wait for an automatic sync or
manually resync your site. The new content item will be reflected in the Items
number for the Amazon S3 connection on your Connections page.

Note: Syncs (manual or automatic) can take up to 24 hours to
complete.




Managing content connected to your Zendesk account

Once you've created a connection, you can view information about the connection, set
viewer permissions for content, and manually resync or remove the connection.
This section contains the following topics:
Viewing connection details
Managing viewer permissions for content
Manually resyncing content
Removing a connection




Viewing connection details

You can use the information panel to view information about the connection, when
it was created and by whom, and when it was last synced.

To view connection details
In Knowledge admin, click Manage articles
( ) in the sidebar.
Click External content > Connections.
Click the options menu ( ) on the row for the connection you want to
manage, then select Manage.

View details about the connection:

Created: When the connection was created

Connected by: Name of the Knowledge admin who created the
connection

Items: Number of synced pages in the connection

Status: Sync status

Last synced: When the last sync occurred. Syncs are
automatically performed every 24 hours, though they can also be
triggered
manually









Managing viewer permissions for content

You can set the viewer permissions for who can view connected content
in your Zendesk workflows.

To manage viewer permissions for content
In Knowledge admin, click Manage articles
( ) in the sidebar.
Click External content > Connections.
Click the options menu ( ) on the row for the connection you want to
manage, then select Manage.
Under Viewing permissions, select one of the following options to
determine which user segments can view content
from this space:

Only visible to selected user segments: Select up to 10
user segments from any of the following (an Enterprise plan is
required to select multiple user segments):

Signed-in users: Includes internal and external
users who create an account and sign in to your help
center.

Agents and admins: Includes team members only, so
that you can create content that is internal-only.
Note: Light agents are included in
this segment. For a list of light agent permissions,
see Understanding and
setting light agent
permissions.


Custom user segment: Allows you to restrict
viewing access to specific users based on tags,
organizations, or groups by applying user segments. See
Creating user
segments to restrict access.



Visible to everyone: Includes anyone who visits your help
center and does not require sign in.


Click Save.





Manually resyncing content

When you connect an external content source, a sync process runs every 24 hours
to update new or changed content. However, you can also manually resync content
to trigger a sync process at any time.

To manually resync content
On the Connections page, click the options menu ( ) for the connection you want to sync.
Select Sync again.
The connection syncs
immediately, and the Last synced column is updated with the most
recent sync time.






Removing a connection

You can remove a connection if you no longer want to sync its content. If you
remove a connection, all content within that connection will be removed.
When you remove a connection, the related content is no longer available wherever external content is used.

To remove a connection
On the Connections page, click the options menu ( ) for the connection you want to
remove.
Select Remove connection.

Review the message, then click Remove. The connection is
removed from the Connection list, and is no longer available as an
external content source.






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