6. Setting up the payments providers

In order to be able to receive payments, you'll need to set up at least one payment provider for your app.

Navigating to Admin > Settings > Payments area, you will be able fetch your site's webhook endpoints to be used with Paypal and Stripe, and fields to fill in their Secret & Public keys.

• Login into your Stripe dashboard.
• From the secondary sidebar, please go to Developers > API Keys.
• Copy the Publishable key and Secret key in the admin panel, over at Admin > Settings > Payments > Processors > Stripe.
• Next up, from the Developers tab, go to Webhooks and click on Add endpoint
• For the Endpoint URL, please copy the webhook endpoint located at Admin > Settings > Payments > Processors > Stripe..
• For the Version field, select the latest version.
• Then, for the Select events to listen to, go with the Select all events.
• Once done with creating the webhook, you will get a Webhook secret, which will need to be added in the Admin > Settings > Payments > Stripe Webhooks Secret field.
• Enable OXXO with Stripe
  • In order to enable OXXO with Stripe you must finish the previous steps first.
  • Login into your Stripe account and search for Payment methods. Enable OXXO as a payment provider
  • Then you can enable Oxxo from admin panel settings: Settings > Payments > Payment Processors > Stripe
  • In the end you need to update the webhook created in a previous step to listen for two new events: checkout.session.async_payment_succeeded / checkout.session.async_payment_failed
• Enable iDEAL, Blik, Bancontact, EPS, Giropay and Przelewy24 with Stripe
  • In order to enable one of the built-in payment providers in Stripe checkout you must finish the previous steps first and have the website currency code set accordingly. (enabling OXXO is optional)
  • Login into your Stripe account and search for Payment methods and enable one of the payment providers.
  • Then you can enable it from admin panel settings: Settings > Payments > Payment Processors > Stripe so they will be shown on the Stripe checkout page

• Login into your Paypal account, using the Paypal developer dasboard.
• Go to the My apps & credentials area, select the Live switch button and then hit Create app button to create a Paypal app.
• Copy the Paypal's ClientID & Paypal Secret Key and add them into the admin into the Settings > Payments area.
• Go to the My apps & credentials area, select the Live switch button and then select your freshly created app.
• Scroll down the page until you reach the Production Webhooks area, where you'll need to click on the Add Webhook button.
• On the Webhook URL field paste your webhook URL. This can be found, as shown in the first screenshoot, over at Admin > Settings > Payments.
• For the Event types, select All Events and hit Save

• Login into your Coinbase Commerce account, using coinbase commerce sign in.
• Go to Settings section.
• Search for API keys
• Click on Create an API key, copy the key and add it into the admin panel into Setting > Payments area.
• Search for Webhook subscriptions
• Click on Add an endpoint. The webhook url can be found over at Admin > Settings > Payments section.
• Then, click on Show shared secret and add that secret into the admin panel, over at Admin > Settings > Payments

• Login into your NowPayments account, using NowPayments sign in.
• Go to Store settings section.
• Add a new API Key
• Copy the key and add it into the admin panel into Setting > Payments area as NowPayments Api Key.
• Go back to your NowPayments account over Store settings and generate an IPN secret key
• Add secret into the admin panel, over at Admin > Settings > Payments as NowPayments IPN Secret Key
• The next step is to add crypto wallets into your NowPayments account.
• We recommend adding as many wallets as possible with different crypto currencies so the conversion rate will be lower.
• We recommend adding a payment covering percentage into your NowPayments account representing percentage of the payment that needs to be paid to be considered completed.

  Example: If set to 5%, an item priced at $100 will be considered fully paid for if the customer transfers cryptocurrency worth 95$.

• In some instances IPN Callback URL is required in order to be able to configure the application on their side. The IPN Callback URL can be found in the admin panel over at Admin > Settings > Payments > NowPayments as Webhook URL
Payment covering percentage is useful for the case where customer accidentally paid a lower amount with a few cents so payment is treated as completed instead of partially paid. In case payment is partially paid admins will receive an email notification that will require manually processing (either refunding the credit to the customer or approve it manually from the admin panel)

• Login into your CCBill account, using CCBill sign in.
• Go to FlexForms Systems and check for Flex ID.
• Copy the Flex ID and add it into the admin panel over at Settings > Payments > Payment processors > CCBill > CCBill FlexForm Id.
• Add your CCBill Account Number over admin settings.
• Login into your CCBill one time payments sub account and go to Account Info > Sub Account Admin
• Under left navigation go to Basic and set your approval & denial URL's by getting them from the admin panel over at Admin > Settings > Payments section
• Then select Webhooks from the left navigation and add your webhook (choose JSON as Webhook Format). You can find the CCBill Webhook URL over the admin settings section.
• Add your sub account number for one time payments into the admin panel, over at Settings > Payments > Payment Processors > CCBill > CCBill SubAccount One Time Payments
• Repeat the above steps for your sub account for recurring payments.
• The last step is to ask CCBill about your Salt key and fill that into the admin panel.
• In order to be able to programmatically cancel CCBill subscriptions you need to set up a DataLink API user.
• Login into your CCBill recurring payments sub account and from the top navigation go to Account info > DataLink Services Suite
• From the left navigation click on Add user and fill in the username and password.
• For Subsystem tick on all the checkboxes then add your VPC ip address on the Valid Ips field
• Click on store user and add the accounts details into the admin panel, over at Settings > Payments > Payment processors > CCBill as CCBill DataLink Username / Password

• Login into your Paystack account, using paystack sign in.
• Go to Settings section.
• Check API Keys & Webhooks tab
• Copy the Secret key and add it into the admin panel into Setting > Payments > Payment processors > Paystack.
• Go into the admin panel and copy Webook & Callback URL's and add them into Paystack

• Login into your MercadoPago developer account, using mercado sign in.
• Go to your applications.
• Click on Create application
• Choose a name for your application
• For What type of payment solution will you integrate? select Online payments
• For Are you using an e-commerce platform? select No
• For Which product are you integrating? select CheckoutPro
• Integration model is optional so you can leave as empty
• After you successfully created the application go to the Production credentials section, copy the Access Token and add it into the admin panel into Setting > Payments > Payment processors > Mercado.

6.1 Withdrawals with Stripe Connect

• If you haven't already, create a Stripe account and add all required details.
• Log in to your Stripe account and navigate to the Stripe Dashboard
• Go to the Connect settings and enable Stripe Connect by agreeing to the terms and conditions
• In the Stripe Dashboard, navigate to Settings > Connect settings.
• Stripe Connect will be responsible for onboarding your customers so you must set up your branding, including logos and colors, to customize the onboarding experience.
• Go to the Payout settings page and set the following:
  External accounts tab
  • Require at least one bank account? -> Up to you but we recommend to set it to yes
  • Allow debit cards? -> Up to you
  • Over Stripe-hosted onboarding for Custom accounts section set Collect external account information for Custom accounts to yes
  Payout schedules tab
  • Disable Allow accounts to manage their payout schedule because we create the payouts manually
  Alternative currency payouts tab
  • Enable Enable accounts to receive payouts in alternative currencies so people with bank accounts added on their connected accounts having another currency than the one you use for your Stripe account will still be able to receive money
• In the end you'll need to set up a new webhook endpoint for Stripe Connect to work properly. Go to the Developers > Webhooks page and set the following:
  • Endpoint URL: Can be found in the admin panel over at Settings > Payments > Withdrawals in the top section as Webhook URL
  • Listen to: Events on Connected accounts
  • Events to listen: account.updated, payout.canceled, payout.failed, payout.paid
  • Click on Add endpoint
  After the new webhook is successfully created in Stripe you'll need to copy the Signing secret into the admin panel over at Settings > Payments > Withdrawals > Stripe Connect Webhooks Secret
• You can now enable Stripe Connect from the admin panel by enabling the Enable Stripe Connect for withdrawals setting

7. Setting up the cron jobs Important

7.1 Crons setup

In order to get the platform fully functional, including the payment system, emails, offers and more, you will need to set up the following cronjob.

* * * * * cd /path-to-your-project && php artisan schedule:run >> /dev/null 2>&1

Some custom web-hosting panels might require the cron task to be set in a different manner. If needed, you could also run the task with absolute paths (or different PHP versions), like this:

* * * * * php /path-to-your-project/artisan schedule:run >> /dev/null 2>&1

7.1 Ensure crons are running

Crons plays an important role in the payment system so please ensure the crons are not returning any fatal error when running them (eg:cd /path-to-your-project && php artisan schedule:run). You can also make sure there are no errors under the crons log file @ storage/logs/cronjobs.log.

8. Setting up the emailing driver

For the mailing driver you can mainly choose between three main options, which are Mailgun via API, SMTP or PHP mail() function, if available. You also have the logging option, in case you're just debugging things.

The emailing settings can be found over at Admin > Settings > Emails. Here's a short description over the settings.

1. Mail from name - Name in which the emails are sent, also attached to email footers.
2. Mail from address - Email address sending from. EG: no-reply@domain.com

8.1 Log driver

The logging driver has mainly debugging purposes. Logged emails can be found under the storage/logs/laravel.log log file.

8.1 Sendmail driver

The sendmail driver can be used if the PHP mail() function is configured on the server. Most of cPanel shared hosting providers has it enabled.

8.3 Mailgun driver

1. Mailgun domain - The domain/subdomain you've set up to use with mailgun. Must have valid DNS records set up priorly.
2. Mailgun secret - The domain API key
3. Mailgun endpoint - api.mailgun.net for US or api.eu.mailgun.net for EU instances

8.4 SMTP driver

1. SMTP Host - Your SMTP server host name / IP.
2. SMTP Port - Generally 587 for TLS and 465 for SSL. Can be different based on the email provider.
3. SMTP Encryption - TLS / SSL
4. SMTP Username - Your SMTP username
5. SMTP Password - Your SMTP password

9. Setting up storage driver

9.1 Setting up AWS S3 hosting & CloudFront

If you dont want to use your server as hosting for your application files you have the option to use AWS S3 (including CloudFront and CloudFront Signed Url's) which is more faster and secure.

To upload your data to Amazon S3, you must first create an Amazon S3 bucket in one of the AWS Regions.

1. Go to AWS Console and login or create an account.
2. After you successfully login into your account go to Search for services area and search for S3.
3. Next up, you should be redirected to S3 page, click on Buckets > Create bucket.
4. Set up your bucket name and region.
5. Enable Make public using ACL option.
6. Disable Block all public access checkbox.
7. Enable I acknowledge that the current settings might result in this bucket and the objects within becoming public checkbox.
8. The other options stay as default.
9. Click on Create bucket after you make sure all the details are correct.
10. After you successfully create the bucket, you need to generate the AWS access keys by going again to Search for services area and search for IAM (Identity and Access Management).
11. Next up, go to Access management > Users and click on Add users.
12. Set an username under user details area and enable Provide user access to the AWS Management Console - optional.
13. Under Set permissions area, click on Attach policies directly and then search for AmazonS3FullAccess and enable this policy (or you can add a custom policy) then click Next.
14. Review the settings, add a tag if you want or leave it default, and then click on Create user.
15. After the user is created, click on the user name in the list to open the user details.
16. Under Security credentials, click on Create access key.
17. In the Create access key dialog, choose the option that best fits your needs and click Create access key.
18. Make sure you save the AWS Access Key ID and Secret access key securely as you won't be able to view the secret access key again after this dialog.
19. Save bucket name, AWS Access Key ID and AWS Secret access key to the admin panel, over at Admin > Settings > Storage.

When you want to use CloudFront to distribute your content, you create a distribution and choose the configuration settings you want.

1. Follow steps from S3 section from above to create bucket.
2. Go to Search for services area and search for CloudFront.
3. Next up, you should be redirected to CloudFront page, click on Distributions > Create distribution.
4. Set your bucket origin under Origin > Origin Domain area by searching for previously created bucket.
5. The other options can stay as default as long as you don't want something custom.
6. After you successfully create distribution, save Distribution domain name to the admin panel, over at Admin > Settings > Storage > Aws CloudFront Domain Name (remove https:// part from the domain name) and enable CloudFront.
7. Check Steps for Creating a Distribution for more details about how to create and setup a CloudFront distribution.

To use signed URLs, you need a signer. A signer is a trusted key group that you create in CloudFront.

1. Create a key pair for a trusted key group:
   The following steps use OpenSSL as an example of one way to create a key pair. There are many other ways to create an RSA key pair.
   • Run openssl genrsa -out private_key.pem 2048 command to generate the private key.
   • Use the following command openssl rsa -pubout -in private_key.pem -out public_key.pem to extract the public key from the file named private_key.pem.
2. To upload the public key to CloudFront:
   • Sign in to the AWS Management Console and open the CloudFront console.
   • In the navigation menu, choose Key management > Public keys > Create public key.
   • For Name, type a name to identify the public key.
   • For Key, paste the public key. If you followed the steps in the preceding procedure, the public key is in the file named public_key.pem.
   To copy and paste the contents of the public key, you can:
   • Use the cat command on the macOS or Linux command line, like this: cat public_key.pem. Copy the output of that command, then paste it into the Key value field.
   • Open the public_key.pem file with a plaintext editor like Notepad (on Windows) or TextEdit (on macOS). Copy the contents of the file, then paste it into the Key value field.
   • Click add and copy the public key ID. You use it later when you create signed URLs, as the value of the Key-Pair-Id field. (this is also the Aws CloudFront Key Pair Id that must be set in admin panel)
3. To add the public key to a key group:
   • In the navigation menu, choose Key management > Key groups > Create key group.
   • For Name, type a name to identify the key group.
   • For Public keys, select the public key to add to the key group, then choose Add.
   • Choose Create key group.
4. Adding a signer to a distribution:
   • Record the key group ID of the key group that you want to use as a trusted signer.
   • Open CloudFront console and choose the distribution whose files you want to protect with signed URLs or signed cookies.
   • Choose the Behaviors tab.
   • Select the cache behavior whose path pattern matches the files that you want to protect with signed URLs or signed cookies, and then choose Edit.
   • For Restrict Viewer Access (Use Signed URLs or Signed Cookies), choose Yes.
   • For Trusted Key Groups or Trusted Signer, choose Trusted Key Groups.
   • For Trusted Key Groups, choose the key group to add, and then choose Add. Repeat if you want to add more than one key group.
   • Choose Save changes to update the cache behavior.
5. Save previously created public Key-Pair-Id to the admin panel, over at Admin > Settings > Storage > Aws CloudFront Key Pair Id.
6. Copy previously created private key pair RSA file into project root by following steps:
   • Copy private_key.pem file into project root.
   • Add private key file path to the admin panel, over at Admin > Settings > Storage and enable CloudFront Signed Url's. (If you followed previously steps this path should look like this private_key.pem)
7. Make sure your S3 bucket permissions are set to public.
8. Check Serving private content with signed URLs for more details about CloudFront Signed Url's.

9.2 Setting up Wasabi storage driver

If you like to use Wasabi instead of S3 for file storage, that can be set by changing the storage driver, out of the Admin > Settings > Storage > Driver.

Once you've done that, you wil have to add your credentials which are available over the Wasabi website. Please make sure you account is validated, so buckets can be available to the public.

You will also need to add the following policy to your bucket:

{
  "Version": "2012-10-17",
  "Statement": [
    {
      "Sid": "AllowPublicRead",
      "Effect": "Allow",
      "Action": "s3:GetObject",
      "Resource": [
        "arn:aws:s3:::your-bucket-name",
        "arn:aws:s3:::your-bucket-name/*"
      ]
    }
  ]
}

Note, that the Wasabi bucket can not have any dots inside it.

9.3 Setting up Digital Ocean Spaces storage driver

If you like to use Digital Ocean Spaces storage, that can be set by changing the storage driver, out of the Admin > Settings > Storage > Driver. Once you selected the new driver, proceed with the following steps:

1. Create a new Spaces access key and copy the key and secret.
2. Go to Admin > Settings > Storage and add your newly created keys into the DO Access Key and DO Secret Key
3. Go to Spaces area and create a new space. Default settings should be just fine.
4. Select the new bucket. You will then see a link of this format https://{bucket-name}.{region}.digitaloceanspaces.com
5. For the DO Bucket, insert the {bucket-name} url section.
6. For the DO Region, insert the {region} url section.

9.4 Setting up Minio storage driver

Once you got your minio instance ready, you can then proceed with changing the storage driver, out of the Admin > Settings > Storage > Driver. Once you selected the new driver, proceed with the following steps:

1. Create a new set of keys and copy the key and secret.
2. Go to Admin > Settings > Storage and add your newly created keys into the Minio Access Key and Minio Secret Key
3. Create a new bucket and fill in the Admin > Settings > Storage > Minio bucket For the Minio Bucket field.
4. For the Admin > Settings > Storage > Minio Region, insert the region your instance is using.
5. For the Admin > Settings > Storage > Minio Endpoint, insert the endpoint your instance is using.

9.5 Setting up PushrCDN storage

Once you got a pushrcdn account, you can then proceed with changing the storage driver, out of the Admin > Settings > Storage > Driver. Once you selected the new driver, proceed with the following steps:

1. Go go the CDN page and create a new Push zone
2. Set a zone label, and for Sonic Storage Type set the AWS S3-compatible.
3. Select the new zone you've created and then click on Storage and Hostnames area.
4. Fill in the pushr storage admin setting fields with the keys, bucketname, S3 endpoint and CDN Hostname values.

10. Setting up Websockets

10.1 Pusher websockets

In order give the app realtime capabilities, used for User messenger & User notifications you will need a Pusher account. Once you got that, follow the steps below:

1. Go to Pusher dashboard and go to the Channels category.
2. Click on Create app. Select a name and cluster region at your preference.
3. Next up, you should be redirected to your new app page. If not, head over Apps and select your app.
4. Copy over the app_id, key, secret and cluster and add save them to the admin panel, over at Admin > Settings > Websockets area.

10.1 Soketi websockets

If you would like to go for a self-hosted solution, then Soketi is also available.

In order to set it up, change the Websockets driver to Soketi and add your configured Host, Port, App id, App key and App secret.

If your soketi instance is running on TSL, enable the Use TSL for Soketi toggle and use 443 port.

11. Setting up FFMpeg

In order to allow your users to upload all types of video formats, you will need to install FFMPEG on your server, if it doesn't have it already. If FFMPEG is not available, the allowed video extensions will fallback to .mp4 only.

Alternatively, if FFMpeg is not available for your server or you just don't want to use it, you can also use remote video transcoding, using coconut, but at additional costs.

12. Live streaming

• Fill in your personal information
• Fill in your payments info
• Go to Media Platform > Go Live Fill in the required verification info

• Go to CDN > Push zones > Create push zone
• Copy the CDN Push zone ID and add it to Admin > Streaming > Pushr Zone Id field
• Copy the Profile > Personal information > API Key, out of this page and add it to Admin > Streaming > Pushr Key field.
• For the Admin > Streaming > Pushr Encoder, please use one of the available encoders (eu, us, sg)

Once you filled in your PushrCDN Zone ID & API Key, your platform then should support live streaming. Out of the admin panel, you can also set your other settings, like VODs, encoders or bitrates.

13. Google reCAPTCHA

In order to enable Google reCAPTCHA for public forms (like register page, contact page, etc), you will need to:

• You can get your API Keys from this link.
• Create a new app and use reCAPTCHA v2 > "I'm not a robot" Checkbox type of keys.
• Copy your Site Key and Key secret and add them into the Admin > Settings > Security > Recaptcha fields.

14. Social login(s)

14.1 Overview

Though the social login providers UI can change, the general steps that must be taken in order to allow social logins is:

• Get an approved app on the social login provider
• Get the ClientID & Client Secret keys
• Add the keys within the Admin > Settings > Social login category
• Within the Admin > Settings > Social login copy the Callback url for the provider
• Add the Callback url for the respective provider, back on their page over the CallbackUrl/Authorized urls section.

14.2 Social providers info

• Go to https://developer.twitter.com and create a new app
• Get elevated access to Twitter api over at this link
• Select the Application Environment (dev or prod), name your app, then you will get the API Key and API Key secret which you need to copy and add them into Admin > Settings > Social login section.
• Once the app is created, go to app settings & click on Setup button from user authentication settings menu.
• Enable the checkbox for OAuth 1.0a in users authentication settings.
• For "App permissions" select "Read".
• Enable the "Request email address from users" option.
• Copy admin Callback url and add it to Callback URLs field, over twitter app's settings.

• Create a project: https://console.developers.google.com/projectcreate
• Create credentials: https://console.developers.google.com/apis/credentials
• Select OAuth client ID > Consent > Web application
• Get Admin > Settings > Social login & Client secret, add them to admin
• Copy admin Callback url and add it to Authorized redirect URIs

• Go to https://developers.facebook.com/apps and create a new app > Consumer and fill in your details.
• Go to your App settings > Basic, then copy the App ID & App secret and add them in the Admin > Settings > Social login section.
• Go to App > Facebook Login > Settings
• Copy admin Callback url and add it to Valid OAuth Redirect URIs

15. GEO-Blocking

The GEO-Blocking feature can be enabled via the Admin > Settings > Security area, where you can enable or disable the feature globally using the Allow users to be able to geoblock their profiles switch.

The other setting you need to fill in is the IP geolocation API key (Abstract API). You can get your geo location API key by registering an account over at Abstract API and get your key over this link IP geolocation API.

16. OpenAI

The AI-suggestions feature can be enabled via the Admin > Settings > AI area, where you can enable or disable the feature, which can offer OpenAI based suggestions for users posts and bio descriptions.

The other setting you need to fill in is the OpenAI Api Key, alongside other prediction settings. You can get your API key by registering an account over at Open-AI site and get your key over this link OpenAI API Keys.

17. Localization

In order to translate your site in any language, you will need to make a copy of the default en.json language file found in lang folder, and change it according to your needs.

• The json language file must follow iso format, eg: es.json, ro.json, en.json.
• If you need to overwrite the validation rules messages or other libraries, the en folder can be copied and renamed to the new language code.

18. Coconut videos transcoding

• Go to coconut.com and register an account
• Go to the API section and get yourself an API key
• Go to Admin > Settings > Videos > Coconut and add your API key
• Configure the rest of the encoding options according to your needs

Before publishing your site, make sure video conversions are working as expected. Transcoded videos results can also be previewed on coconut's dashboard.