API development stopped?

TazzyTazzy · June 29, 2006

Has development stopped on the API interface? I sure hope not. There are some areas that I see can use some improvement. Right off the top of my head:

Comments: Am I blind, or is there no way to access comments on a photo? Need something to access comments on photos, maybe save a comment, and also list "recent" comments for spam/abuse patrol.

Keywords: Be nice to "show me all pictures with these keywords".

Additional Image methods: Return random images from public galleries. Or, if submitted, random images for a specific gallery. Also, "last X pictures uploaded" would be a great method too.

I'd even contribute code to you to for you review to include in the API system - of course depending on it's language. I've no probs signing a non-disclosure agreement if needed (wouldn't be the first time i've done that). I've strong PHP/MySQL skills (see my Drupal module for smugmug post).

-Mitch

mpmcleod · June 29, 2006

TazzyTazzy wrote:

Has development stopped on the API interface? I sure hope not. There are some areas that I see can use some improvement. Right off the top of my head:

Comments: Am I blind, or is there no way to access comments on a photo? Need something to access comments on photos, maybe save a comment, and also list "recent" comments for spam/abuse patrol.

Keywords: Be nice to "show me all pictures with these keywords".

Additional Image methods: Return random images from public galleries. Or, if submitted, random images for a specific gallery. Also, "last X pictures uploaded" would be a great method too.

I'd even contribute code to you to for you review to include in the API system - of course depending on it's language. I've no probs signing a non-disclosure agreement if needed (wouldn't be the first time i've done that). I've strong PHP/MySQL skills (see my Drupal module for smugmug post).

-Mitch

API looks to be totally off the SM radar and even they state it is a totally unsupported feature. They do not even fix bugs in the API, much less add new features. For now they are struggling just to keep the systems operational and I doubt they can spend time on a feature only a few people actually use.

I am grateful for what they do offer. The API is MUCH more than anyone else (that I know of) offers. It is one of the main reasons I joined and because of it I have been able to fix many issues with my site. I am a bit disappointed and would like to see a bit of effort directed at the API but I understand SMs position.

onethumb · June 29, 2006

TazzyTazzy wrote:

Has development stopped on the API interface? I sure hope not. There are some areas that I see can use some improvement. Right off the top of my head:

Comments: Am I blind, or is there no way to access comments on a photo? Need something to access comments on photos, maybe save a comment, and also list "recent" comments for spam/abuse patrol.

Sorry, comments aren't exposed via the API yet. To my knowledge, you're the first request - so I'll add it to the list.

TazzyTazzy wrote:

Keywords: Be nice to "show me all pictures with these keywords".

This is provided via RSS & Atom feeds already.

TazzyTazzy wrote:

Additional Image methods: Return random images from public galleries. Or, if submitted, random images for a specific gallery. Also, "last X pictures uploaded" would be a great method too.

Random images are already provided without the API: http://www.smugmug.com/photos/random.mg?AlbumID=XXX&Size=SMUGSIZE

Last X pictures uploaded is provided via RSS/Atom feeds.

Thanks,

Don

onethumb · June 29, 2006

mpmcleod wrote:

API looks to be totally off the SM radar and even they state it is a totally unsupported feature. They do not even fix bugs in the API, much less add new features. For now they are struggling just to keep the systems operational and I doubt they can spend time on a feature only a few people actually use.

I am grateful for what they do offer. The API is MUCH more than anyone else (that I know of) offers. It is one of the main reasons I joined and because of it I have been able to fix many issues with my site. I am a bit disappointed and would like to see a bit of effort directed at the API but I understand SMs position.

Interesting. I spend a few hours a week on the API, so I'm surprised to hear it's "totally off the radar".

We're also not struggling to keep systems operational, thankyouverymuch.

Finally, we have thousands of people using the API every day, so it's certainly not something "only a few people actually use".

It'll continue to improve, though.

Don

TazzyTazzy · June 29, 2006

Don,

onethumb wrote:

Sorry, comments aren't exposed via the API yet. To my knowledge, you're the first request - so I'll add it to the list.

Sweeeet! Thanks. Really looking forward to it.

onethumb wrote:

This is provided via RSS & Atom feeds already.

I see "recent photos" as an RSS feed, but not a keyword lookup.

onethumb wrote:

Random images are already provided without the API: http://www.smugmug.com/photos/random.mg?AlbumID=XXX&Size=SMUGSIZE

Last X pictures uploaded is provided via RSS/Atom feeds.

The random image thing is nice to get a random image for a single gallery, but what about from your entire gallery? I searched, I didn't find anything - might have searched wrong. I also tried to use google to search dgrin, but that didn't find much either.

Overall, i think it would be nice if we could get all these wonderful resources through the API - instead of having to switch between RSS and API connections. I've written a smugmug API abstraction layer which incorporates a local cache of API calls (cuts down on API requests significantly). Using this single layer, I can easily access any smugmug method from the API and have it cached (if desired).

Thanks for the quick response, and like others, I appreciate everything you've done thus far. Let me know if you want me to contribute any code. :-)

-Mitch

mpmcleod · June 29, 2006

onethumb wrote:

We're also not struggling to keep systems operational, thankyouverymuch.

Don

My statement was a little harsh and I apologize.

mpmcleod · June 29, 2006

onethumb wrote:

Interesting. I spend a few hours a week on the API, so I'm surprised to hear it's "totally off the radar".

Finally, we have thousands of people using the API every day, so it's certainly not something "only a few people actually use".

It'll continue to improve, though.

Don

Don,

It is GREAT news that API development continues. It is also good to know that lots of people use it.

I have been hanging out here for some time looking for API news and have not heard (read?) even a peep about the API from SM. From that I gathered that API development was stopped. Perhaps it would have been better if I had said "I have not noticed any work on it in some time"?

This posting was based on my feeling that API development had been abandoned by SM.

So where do these feeling come from?
1) the last (and only) entry in the API blog was over 1 year ago (June 21, 2005).

2) the last API related post from Onethumb (based on keyword api and dgrinner onethumb in the search) was more than 6 months ago (certainly could have been some that I have missed).

3) the beta has been in place for more than 1 year.

4) "They're not supported, endorsed, or guaranteed in any way."

5) No response to bug reports (from myself and other's) regarding the API. except from other dgrinners who stated, without challenge from SM, that API bugs took up to 6 months to fix (e.g. http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=34964&highlight=api)

6) No official response (until today) to users requests for API features.

Taken together, these items appeared to indicate a lack of continuing development of the API.

I am very pleased to know that development continues and look forward to the next release.

thanks for the update!

ColinB · July 8, 2006

The only evidence I've seen lately that anyone is working on the API is that the beta functions are all screwed up. And that's a downgrade, because they were working before. That's nice that Don says he's working on the API, but for all the reasons mpmcleod posted, I'm going to take that with a grain of salt.

Overall I'm really happy with Smugmug, and I've convinced at least 10 of my friends to sign up, and some of them have gotten their friends to sign up. So trust me, I'm a big fan. However, I'm really disappointed with the API support.

SmugMug is really only hurting themselves by leaving the API in this state. Almost all SmugMug apps are free, so most of the devs aren't making any money off this. I'm a game developer by day, so that's what pays the bills. I write apps for things like Smugmug for fun. Smugmug should be embracing the devs who are so passionate about the site, because any apps that they write can help to differentiate Smugmug from all the other photo sharing sites out there. On that subject, I think it would help if Smugmug had an "unsupported software" page, with links to all the apps people have made.

EDIT: I just noticed the "hacks: apps" page, so you can ignore the last bit. However, I do think it should be more visible.

TazzyTazzy · September 11, 2006

Commends?

onethumb wrote:

Sorry, comments aren't exposed via the API yet. To my knowledge, you're the first request - so I'll add it to the list.

Any update on getting comments VIA API? Would be nice to read/write to them via the API.

onethumb wrote:

Random images are already provided without the API: http://www.smugmug.com/photos/random.mg?AlbumID=XXX&Size=SMUGSIZE

It would still be nice just to get an image number from a simple API call. I wrote an API interface in PHP to smugmug, and API calls are now very simple. :-)

Along that lines, would be nice to get the last XX images uploaded. :-) I know it's via RSS, but getting it through the API would be nice so I can use my API abstraction layer for smugmug.

Lastly, getting keywords, or, sending a list of keywords to the API and getting a list of images with those (or without) keywords would be grand.

-Mitch

mhilbush · September 12, 2006

I'd also like to see some fixes to the current APIs! I know new features are great, and I'd like to see some of those features supported in the APIs, too. But, there are number of production (i.e. non-beta) REST APIs that appear to be broken:
- categories.create
- categories.rename
- subcategories.create
- subcategories.delete
- subcategories.rename

Regarding the beta APIs, there also are several that are broken as best I can tell:
- albums.get (heavy version) - erroneously includes a subcategory when there isn't one
- users.getTree - been a while since I tried this so I don't remember the specifics. I can provide details if needed.

If fixes or new features are put into production, it'd be great to see a post to this forum listing the features and fixes. It'd also be nice to have the docs updated to reflect the changes. In some cases, (images.getInfo returns URLs), the docs should be updated to relect what is actually in production.

I really am a big fan of the API, so please don't take my remarks negatively. I've written a script to integrate my IMatch image management system with Smugmug. And, thanks to the APIs, it works fantastic (it's posted on the photools.com forum in case anyone is interested)!! I'd just like to see some things work correctly (and keep the new features coming).

Thanks for listening.
Mark

devbobo · September 12, 2006

mhilbush wrote:

- albums.get (heavy version) - erroneously includes a subcategory when there isn't one

Mark,

I can't comment all your points, but I am very surprised at this one. I have been using this API call for well over a year and with no problems.

Cheers,

David

mhilbush · September 12, 2006

Here's a snippet from the heavy version of albums.get. Note the subcategory tag of "Georgetown Womens Lacrosse 2006" for the "12 Hours at the Point (6/05/2005)" album covering the 12 hour endurance race at Summit Point raceway. This album does not even have a subcategory!

If I were to offer a diagnosis of the problem, I would say that a variable in the server-side code is not being reset when the app encounters an album with no subcategories. In my example below, this subcategory occurs further up in the XML stream. And, it show up in every album without a subcategory until an album with a subcategory is encountered.

Does this make sense? It also might help explain why you have not seen the problem.
<album id="660856"><highlight id="0"><community id="0"><description><keywords><album id="660856"><highlight id="0"><community id="0"><description><keywords>
</keywords></description></community></highlight></album></keywords></description></community></highlight></album>

&lt;Album id="660856"&gt;
&lt;Highlight id="0"/&gt;
&lt;Community id="0"/&gt;
&lt;Position&gt;39&lt;/Position&gt;
&lt;ImageCount&gt;22&lt;/ImageCount&gt;
&lt;Title&gt;12 Hours at the Point (6/05/2005)&lt;/Title&gt;
&lt;Description/&gt;
&lt;Keywords/&gt;
&lt;Public&gt;1&lt;/Public&gt;
&lt;Password/&gt;
&lt;Printable&gt;1&lt;/Printable&gt;
&lt;Filenames&gt;1&lt;/Filenames&gt;
&lt;Comments&gt;1&lt;/Comments&gt;
&lt;External&gt;1&lt;/External&gt;
&lt;Originals&gt;0&lt;/Originals&gt;
&lt;EXIF&gt;0&lt;/EXIF&gt;
&lt;Share&gt;0&lt;/Share&gt;
&lt;SortMethod&gt;FileName&lt;/SortMethod&gt;
&lt;SortDirection&gt;0&lt;/SortDirection&gt;
&lt;LastUpdated&gt;2005-07-15 05:22:51&lt;/LastUpdated&gt;
&lt;FamilyEdit&gt;1&lt;/FamilyEdit&gt;
&lt;FriendEdit&gt;1&lt;/FriendEdit&gt;
&lt;HideOwner&gt;0&lt;/HideOwner&gt;
&lt;Larges&gt;0&lt;/Larges&gt;
&lt;Clean&gt;1&lt;/Clean&gt;
&lt;Protected&gt;1&lt;/Protected&gt;
&lt;Watermark&gt;0&lt;/Watermark&gt;
&lt;DefaultColor&gt;0&lt;/DefaultColor&gt;
&lt;Header&gt;0&lt;/Header&gt;
&lt;Template id="3"/&gt;
&lt;Category id="62032"&gt;
&lt;Title&gt;Motorsports&lt;/Title&gt;
&lt;/Category&gt;
&lt;SubCategory id="158294"&gt;
&lt;Title&gt;Georgetown Womens Lacrosse 2006&lt;/Title&gt;
&lt;/SubCategory&gt;
&lt;/Album&gt;<album id="660856"><highlight id="0"><community id="0"><description><keywords><template id="3">
</template>

</keywords></description></community></highlight></album>

devbobo · September 12, 2006

oh...by the looks of it, you are using the REST api...is that correct ?

I'm using the XML-RPC API, so that might be why it works for me and not you.

Cheers,

David

mhilbush · September 13, 2006

Yes, I'm still using the REST api. I've not pursued XML-RPC. The VB scripting in IMatch is pretty basic, so I had not bothered to look for an XML-RPC library that would work in that environment. I'll check to see if I can find an XML-RPC implementation that'll work. If so, I'll give that api a try.
Mark

devbobo · September 13, 2006

mhilbush wrote:

Yes, I'm still using the REST api. I've not pursued XML-RPC. The VB scripting in IMatch is pretty basic, so I had not bothered to look for an XML-RPC library that would work in that environment. I'll check to see if I can find an XML-RPC implementation that'll work. If so, I'll give that api a try.
Mark

the XML-RPC API has the same calls as REST, it's requests and responses are just configured differently.

mhilbush · September 16, 2006

Any comments from the folks at Smugmug whether (and when) api problems, such as the one described above with the heavy version of albums.get, will be fixed? How about the category/subcategory management apis?
Thanks,
Mark

mhilbush · September 26, 2006

Bump.