Google updated its OAuth playground, a tool to try out several of its many Google APIs. There’s finally a new Basecamp API to go along with the updated version of the site. Plus: why APIs suck, Sweden’s second-best API and 10 new APIs.
Google is helping make sense of OAuth 2.0, especially alongside several of its APIs. The search giant blogged about its new features, which include client-side flow and an option to automatically refresh access tokens.
It’s been almost a month since Basecamp’s non-API upgrade. The company even used the word “finally” to describe that month-long wait in its official post:
We’re finally ready to unveil the API for the new Basecamp. The documentation lives on Github and we encourage developers to help us improve it with pull requests.
The new API covers most of what’s available in the web UI and whatever is currently not there, we’ll be sure to add in the future. You can create projects, add people to those projects, work the calendar, upload files, the works.
It’s strange these days for a service that already has an API to launch major changes without corresponding changes in the API. In fact, more likely is to see the changes first in the API. Luckily, the company has them synched now.
Martijn Linssen has some appropriate observations about APIs, which includes a “random” sampling from our directory. The first complaint is with the term “open web APIs:”
First of all, API’s aren’t open. The fact that you can read about an API and use it, by making a request to it and getting data in return, is not a god-like miracle: it’s so self-evident that it’s boring. If you call an API open because it does allow you to do that, you might as well call a radio open, or a TV: change the channel, and – oh no!, it’s a miracle – you get a different set of data on the spot. API’s are closed: the companies that offer them, decide what’s in them, when it’s in them, where it’s in them, and how it’s in them: and you just have to put up with that
Too many APIs are free, writes Linssen, which means there’s no accountability. The final reason for APIs to suck is one we’re all way too familiar with: bad documentation.
Today we had 10 new APIs added to our API directory including a social media monitoring service, online fashion community, legal practice management service, German elected officials information service, merchant information service, affilate commissions reporting service and social site login service. Below is more details on each of these new APIs.
Beevolve Crawler API: Beevolve offers users a social media monitoring platform. The service monitors brand conversations across social networks and determines the sentiment. The Beevolve API allows users to download the crawled data to their servers. That data can then be integrated into a third party application or web site. Public documentation of the API is not available.
Chictopia API: Chictopia is an online fashion blogging community. With over 200,000 registered users Chictopia is a leading online fashion network offering members fashion inspiration.
Chictopia offers partners a free API that lets them pull images from the site and created branded style galleries. Users can access these images through JSON data feeds. Public documentation is not available.
Clio API: Clio is a legal practice management system aimed at solo practitioners and small firms. It offers a suite of tools to help users manage their practice including document management, time tracking, billing, scheduling and more. The Clio API allows users to access functionality of the system and data stored within. Functionality includes operations on activities, bills, contacts, matters, tasks and users. The API uses RESTful calls and responses are formatted in JSON.
deutschland API: The Deutschland API lets users access information about elected officials. This information includes candidates, mandates, internet links, social profiles and more. Methods include politician, petitions, people, spatial data, committees and more. The API uses RESTful calls and responses are formatted in XML, JSON, JSONP, CSV and Key Values.
MyCase API: MyCase is a social practice management platform for legal professionals. It allows lawyers to access their documents, emails, client contact information, billing data and other core applications. The Open API enables developers create technologies for the MyCase technology platform. Full documentation is not publicly available.
NetBase Insight API: Netbase is a social media monitoring service. The service monitors social media sites to see what people are saying about a business and combines this with natural language processing to deliver sentiment analysis and social insights.
The NetBase Insight API allows users to utilize NetBase’s functionality including sentiment, opinion, emotion, and behavior analysis. The API uses RESTful calls and responses are formatted in XML and JSON. Full public documentation is not available. More info can be read here:
http://http.cdnlayer.com/netbaseweb/wp-content/uploads/API_Datasheet.pdf
Skimlinks Merchant API: Skimlinks is a technology that helps users monetize online content by converting normal product links from thousands of retailers into their equivalent affiliate links.
The Merchants API is the main interface for publishers wishing to know statistics about the merchants on our networks. The Merchants API returns all merchants that Skimlinks works with. Information exposed includes commission rate, conversion rate and domains associated with the merchant. The API can also be used to conduct searches for merchants. The API uses RESTful calls and responses are formatted in XML, JSON and PHP.
Skimlinks Reporting API: Skimlinks is a technology that helps users monetize online content by converting normal product links from thousands of retailers into their equivalent affiliate links.
The Reporting API lets publishers look up their commission information both current and historical. Methods include Report Commissions History, Report Commissions, Report Days, Report Merchants and Report Days by Merchant. The API uses RESTful calls and responses are formatted in XML and JSON.
StesCodes Social Event Manager API: StesCodes is a web solution provider. As part of their portfolio of services, StesCodes offers several APIs. The StesCodes Social Event Manager provides the ability to create one click buttons from which the user can give access to StesCodes to manage their calendars across various social networks. Using the API, events from StesCodes will be placed in the user's calendar. The API uses HTTP calls and responses are formatted in XML and JSON.
StesCodes Social Login API: StesCodes is a web solution provider. As part of their portfolio of services, StesCodes offers several APIs. The StesCodes Social Login provides the ability to login the user in clicks. It's functionality includes getting an access token and an authentication URL as well as getting information on the user trying to login. The API uses HTTP calls and responses are formatted in XML and JSON.
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One Response to “Today in APIs: Google OAuth 2.0, Basecamp and 10 New APIs”
at 9:58 pm
[...] Today in APIs: Google OAuth 2.0, Basecamp and 10 New APIs Today we had 10 new APIs added to our API directory including a social media monitoring service, online fashion community, legal practice management service, German elected officials information service, merchant information service, … Read more on ProgrammableWeb (blog) [...]