Airship

Send your event data from RudderStack to Airship.

Airship is an app experience platform that lets you create and deliver powerful in-app experiences with the help of engaging, personalized content and actionable customer insights.

RudderStack supports Airship as a destination to which you can seamlessly send your event data.

info
Find the open source transformer code for this destination in the GitHub repository.

Getting started

Before configuring Airship as a destination in RudderStack, verify if the source platform is supported by referring to the table below:

Connection ModeWebMobileServer
Device mode---
Cloud modeSupportedSupportedSupported
info
To learn more about the difference between cloud mode and device mode in RudderStack, refer to the RudderStack Connection Modes guide.

Once you have confirmed that the source platform supports sending events to Airship, follow these steps:

  1. From your RudderStack dashboard, add the source. Then, from the list of destinations, select Airship.
  2. Assign a name to your destination and click Next.

Connection settings

To successfully configure Airship as a destination, you will need to configure the following settings:

Airship connection settings
  • API Key: Enter your Airship token which is required by RudderStack to communicate with your Airship project and authenticate all supported event calls, that is, identify, track, and group.
info
For detailed steps on obtaining the API key, refer to the FAQ section below.
  • App Key: Enter your Airship project’s app key which is required for the track calls. You can obtain the app key by going to Settings > Project Details in your Airship dashboard.
info
For detailed steps on obtaining the Airship app key, refer to the FAQ section below.
  • EU data center: Enable this setting if you’ve implemented your app in Airship’s European data center.
info
If you’re unsure which data center you are on, reach out to Airship support.

Identify

The identify call lets you uniquely identify a user and record any associated traits about them like their name, email, etc.

A sample identify call is shown below:

rudderanalytics.identify("1hKOmRA4el9Zt1WSfVJIVo4GRlm", {
  likes_movies: true,
  favorite_color: "purple",
  age: 13
});

In the above code snippet, RudderStack sends the Boolean values to Airship as tags, whereas the non-Boolean values are sent as attributes.

info
RudderStack maps some reserved traits to the predefined Airship attributes. Refer to the Traits mapping section below for more information.

Tags

To successfully assign tags to Airship using the RudderStack identify events, you must create a tag group with the group key set to rudderstack_integration in Airship.

info
For more information on creating a tag group in Airship, refer to the FAQ section below.

This integration supports identify traits of type Boolean only. Airship adds tags for the traits that are set to true and removes tags for the traits set to false.

Attributes

For identify traits that are not mapped to any predefined or custom-defined Airship attributes, you must create and enable those attributes in the Airship dashboard.

info
Refer to the FAQ section below for more information on creating and enabling attributes in Airship.

Track

The track call lets you capture user events along with the properties associated with them.

RudderStack sends the track events to Airship via their Custom Events API. You can use the event properties to personalize and trigger specific messages for your audience.

info
You need the Airship project’s App Key for authenticating the track calls.

A sample track call is shown below:

rudderanalytics.track("Product Clicked", {
  description: "Shoes viewed",
  brand: "Sneakers",
  colors: ["red", "blue"],
  items: [
    {
      text: "New Balance Sneakers",
      price: "$69.95"
    },
    {
      text: "G.I. Joe Sneakers",
      price: "$99.95"
    }
  ]
});

The event name sent to Airship must not contain any upper case characters. Otherwise, it is rejected with a 400 status code. RudderStack handles this by converting any upper case characters to lower case and replacing any spaces with an underscore(_).

In the snippet above, the event name Product Clicked is automatically converted to product_clicked before sending to Airship.

info
RudderStack also maps some event properties to the Airship properties before sending them over to Airship. For more information, refer to the Supported mappings section below.

Group

The group call lets you link an identified user with a group such as a company, organization, or an account, and record any traits associated with that group, e.g., company name, number of employees, etc.

A sample group call is shown below:

rudderanalytics.group({
  userId: "1hKOmRA4el9Zt1WSfVJIVo4GRlm",
  likes_movies: true,
  age: 13
});

In the above code snippet, RudderStack sends the Boolean values to Airship as tags, whereas the non-Boolean values are sent as attributes.

This integration supports group traits of type Boolean only. Airship adds tags for the traits that are set to true and removes tags for the traits set to false.

warning
To successfully assign tags to Airship using the RudderStack group events, you must create a tag group with the group key set to rudderstack_integration_group in Airship. Similarly, you need to create the relevant attribute identifiers in Airship to set the attributes on the named users.
info
For more information on creating a tag group or attributes in Airship, refer to the FAQ section below.

Supported mappings

RudderStack maps the following event properties to the Airship properties before sending them over to Airship.

RudderStack propertyAirship propertyPresence
userIdnamed_user_idRequired
eventnameRequired
propertiespropertiesOptional
valuevalueOptional
interactionIdinteraction_idOptional
interactionTypeinteraction_typeOptional
sessionIdsession_idOptional
transactiontransactionOptional
timestampoccurredOptional

Traits mapping

RudderStack traitAirship attribute
address.citycity
address.countrycountry
address.postalcodezipcode
address.stateregion
createdAtaccount_creation
firstNamefirst_name
lastNamelast_name
namefull_name
phonemobile_phone

FAQ

Where can I obtain the Airship API key?

The Airship API key is required so that RudderStack can communicate with your Airship project. This is a mandatory field to set up the integration.

To obtain your Airship project’s API key, follow these steps:

  1. In your Airship dashboard, go to Settings.
  2. In the Project configuration window, go to Tokens and click Manage.
  3. Then, click Create token.
  4. Assign a name for your token. Under Role, select All access from the dropdown:
Airship project token
  1. Once the token is created, copy and secure the credentials and click Got it.

Where can I obtain the Airship App Key?

To obtain your Airship project’s app key, follow these steps:

  1. In your Airship dashboard, go to Settings.
  2. In the Project configuration window, look for the Project Details pane on the right side.

You will find your project’s app key listed here.

How do I create a custom tag group in Airship?

To create a tag group in Airship, follow these steps:

  1. Go to Settings > Project configuration > Tag Groups and click Manage.
  2. Click Create Tag Group and enter the following settings:
    • Name: Enter the name for the tag group.
    • Description: Set additional information about the tag group in this field.
    • Group Key: Assign a unique ID for the tag group in this field. For example, to assign tags using the RudderStack identify events, you can set this to rudderstack-integration. For assigning tags using the group events, set this to rudderstack-integration-group.

For more information, refer to the Airship documentation.

How do I create and enable attributes in Airship?

For identify traits that are not mapped to any predefined or custom-defined Airship attributes, you must create and enable those attributes in the Airship dashboard. To do so, follow these steps:

  1. Go to your Airship dashboard.
  2. Navigate to Audience > Attributes.
  3. Click Create Attribute.
  4. Enter the Attribute ID, Name, and select the attribute Type.
  5. Finally, click Add.
Airship new attributes

Questions? Contact us by email or on Slack