Posts tagged with “API”
The Official Viddler Ruby Gem
I just announced our new Ruby gem over on the Viddler blog. It’s a fairly basic wrapper for our v2 API for now, but I definitely have plans for some really cool features, like having ActiveModel compatible classes for stuff like videos, playlists, users, etc., as well as making it easy to integrate into existing ActiveRecord models in Rails.
So, if you’re into Ruby and you’re looking for a way to integrate video into your site, definitely check us out. We have a really great API, and now that there’s an official gem, it’s easier than ever to get started.
Simple APIs using SerializeWithOptions
Viget Labs rolls out a Rails plugin to cleanup your API’s code.
Instead of doing this in the controller:
@speaker.to_xml(
:methods => [:average_rating, :avatar_url],
:except => [:email, :claim_code],
:include => {
:talks => {
:methods => :average_rating,
:except => :creator_id
}
}
)
You move it to the class like this:
class Speaker < ActiveRecord::Base
serialize_with_options do
methods :average_rating, :avatar_url
except :email,
:claim_code
includes :talks
end
end
Great way to DRY up your code.
Get Your API Right
A great post by Trek Glowacki with 8 tips on creating an API. My favorites are #2 - Use Your Verbs and #4 - Use Your Status Codes. It’s amazing how much simpler an API can be if you integrate basic REST principles, and if you’re using Rails, it’s super easy to do.
DreamMount
A Mac OS X tool for mounting your Dreamhost account on your computer, created for DreamHost’s API Contest (winners were announced today). I haven’t had a chance to give this a whirl yet, but it sounds pretty promising.
Brightkite API Documentation Released
Brightkite released their API documentation today, which hopefully will lead to some really cool uses of the location data. I’ve already got a few ideas for widget type things that integrate Brightkite, so I hope to have some free time soon to start working on those.