vapor-docs/docs/advanced/apns.md

# APNS

Vapor's Apple Push Notification Service (APNS) API makes it easy to authenticate and send push notifications to Apple devices. It's built on top of [APNSwift](https://github.com/swift-server-community/APNSwift).

## Getting Started

Let's take a look at how you can get started using APNS.

### Package

The first step to using APNS is adding the package to your dependencies.

```swift
// swift-tools-version:5.8
import PackageDescription

let package = Package(
    name: "my-app",
    dependencies: [
         // Other dependencies...
        .package(url: "https://github.com/vapor/apns.git", from: "4.0.0"),
    ],
    targets: [
        .target(name: "App", dependencies: [
            // Other dependencies...
            .product(name: "VaporAPNS", package: "apns")
        ]),
        // Other targets...
    ]
)
```

If you edit the manifest directly inside Xcode, it will automatically pick up the changes and fetch the new dependency when the file is saved. Otherwise, from Terminal, run `swift package resolve` to fetch the new dependency.

### Configuration

The APNS module adds a new property `apns` to `Application`. To send push notifications, you will need to set the `configuration` property with your credentials.

```swift
import APNS
import VaporAPNS
import APNSCore

// Configure APNS using JWT authentication.
let apnsConfig = APNSClientConfiguration(
    authenticationMethod: .jwt(
        privateKey: try .loadFrom(string: "<#key.p8 content#>"),
        keyIdentifier: "<#key identifier#>",
        teamIdentifier: "<#team identifier#>"
    ),
    environment: .development
)
app.apns.containers.use(
    apnsConfig,
    eventLoopGroupProvider: .shared(app.eventLoopGroup),
    responseDecoder: JSONDecoder(),
    requestEncoder: JSONEncoder(),
    as: .default
)
```

Fill in the placeholders with your credentials. The above example shows [JWT-based auth](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/usernotifications/setting_up_a_remote_notification_server/establishing_a_token-based_connection_to_apns) using the `.p8` key you get from Apple's developer portal. For [TLS-based auth](https://developer.apple.com/documentation/usernotifications/setting_up_a_remote_notification_server/establishing_a_certificate-based_connection_to_apns) with a certificate, use the `.tls` authentication method: 

```swift
authenticationMethod: .tls(
    privateKeyPath: <#path to private key#>,
    pemPath: <#path to pem file#>,
    pemPassword: <#optional pem password#>
)
```

### Send

Once APNS is configured, you can send push notifications using `apns.send` method on `Application` or `Request`. 

```swift
// Custom Codable Payload
struct Payload: Codable {
    let acme1: String
    let acme2: Int
}
// Create push notification Alert
let dt = "70075697aa918ebddd64efb165f5b9cb92ce095f1c4c76d995b384c623a258bb"
let payload = Payload(acme1: "hey", acme2: 2)
let alert = APNSAlertNotification(
    alert: .init(
        title: .raw("Hello"),
        subtitle: .raw("This is a test from vapor/apns")
    ),
    expiration: .immediately,
    priority: .immediately,
    topic: "<#my topic#>",
    payload: payload
)
// Send the notification
try! await req.apns.client.sendAlertNotification(
    alert, 
    deviceToken: dt, 
    deadline: .distantFuture
)
```

Use `req.apns` whenever you are inside of a route handler.

```swift
// Sends a push notification.
app.get("test-push") { req async throws -> HTTPStatus in
    try await req.apns.client.send(...)
    return .ok
}
```

The first parameter accepts the push notification alert and the second parameter is the target device token. 

## Alert

`APNSAlertNotification` is the actual metadata of the push notification alert to send. More details on the specifics of each property are provided [here](https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/NetworkingInternet/Conceptual/RemoteNotificationsPG/PayloadKeyReference.html). They follow a one-to-one naming scheme listed in Apple's documentation.

```swift
let alert = APNSAlertNotification(
    alert: .init(
        title: .raw("Hello"),
        subtitle: .raw("This is a test from vapor/apns")
    ),
    expiration: .immediately,
    priority: .immediately,
    topic: "<#my topic#>",
    payload: payload
)
```

This type can be passed directly to the `send` method.

### Custom Notification Data

Apple provides engineers with the ability to add custom payload data to each notification. In order to facilitate this we accept `Codable` conformance to the payload parameter on all `send` apis.

```swift
// Custom Codable Payload
struct Payload: Codable {
    let acme1: String
    let acme2: Int
}
```

## More Information

For more information on available methods, see [APNSwift's README](https://github.com/swift-server-community/APNSwift).