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[https://www.idigbio.org/ Integrated Digitized Biocollections (iDigBio)] is the National Resource for Advancing Digitization of Biodiversity Collections (ADBC) funded by the National Science Foundation. Through ADBC, data and images for millions of biological specimens are being made available in electronic format for the research community, government agencies, students, educators, and the general public. iDigBio is a data aggregator. This means that data is provided to iDigBio through various publishing mechanisms. | [https://www.idigbio.org/ Integrated Digitized Biocollections (iDigBio)] is the National Resource for Advancing Digitization of Biodiversity Collections (ADBC) funded by the National Science Foundation. Through ADBC, data and images for millions of biological specimens are being made available in electronic format for the research community, government agencies, students, educators, and the general public. iDigBio is a data aggregator. This means that data is provided to iDigBio through various publishing mechanisms. | ||
Many consumers of the iDigBio aggregated data will choose to use the [https://www.idigbio.org/portal iDigBio Portal web site]. Although our portal has many features, to facilitate integration of iDigBio data with other web sites, services, or research uses, iDigBio provides APIs in order to provide direct access to our data. We ourselves make use of these APIs in our portal and other data services so any functionality you see there, as well as functions not available through the portal, can be done through APIs yourself. | Many consumers of the iDigBio aggregated data will choose to use the [https://www.idigbio.org/portal iDigBio Portal web site]. Although our portal has many features and is the easiest interface to use, to facilitate integration of iDigBio data with other web sites, services, or research uses, iDigBio provides APIs in order to provide direct access to our data. We ourselves make use of these APIs in our portal and other data services so any functionality you see there, as well as functions not available through the portal, can be done through APIs yourself. | ||
The iDigBio APIs are an abstraction layer for retrieving data from the iDigBio back-end data systems. This abstraction allows reuse and mashup of aggregated data without needing to understand the complex underlying details of the back-end data storage. Currently, the public APIs support HTTP GET and POST requests for data read operations only. The iDigBio APIs are RESTful web services that delivers data primarily as [https://www.json.org/ JSON] documents. | The iDigBio APIs are an abstraction layer for retrieving data from the iDigBio back-end data systems. This abstraction allows reuse and mashup of aggregated data without needing to understand the complex underlying details of the back-end data storage. Currently, the public APIs support HTTP GET and POST requests for data read operations only. The iDigBio APIs are RESTful web services that delivers data primarily as [https://www.json.org/ JSON] documents. | ||
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You can join via the web at: http://lists.ufl.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=IDIGBIO-API-USERS-L | You can join via the web at: http://lists.ufl.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A0=IDIGBIO-API-USERS-L | ||
== | == Searching iDigBio == | ||
There are several APIs you can use to retrieve data from iDigBio: | |||
# Search API | |||
# Download API | |||
# Original v1 API | |||
== | === Search API === | ||
The version 2 Search API was released in mid 2015 and is the current API that the portal and other iDigBio services are based on. Full documentation for this API is available in the [https://github.com/idigbio/idigbio-search-api/wiki idbsearch-api Github wiki] for the source code. The search API allows you to retrieve limited sets of data in response to custom queries and is typically the one people use. | |||
== | === Download API === | ||
The Download API can be used to generated [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darwin_Core_Archive Darwin Core archives] containing any amount of data up to everything that is in iDigBio. This API is documented on the [[iDigBio Download API]] wiki page. This API is useful when the size of the data you want exceeds what you can get through the search API. Be aware that this is not an interactive API; requests will result in a queued job being started to make the Darwin Core archive and you will be informed when it is ready to download later. | |||
=== Other APIs === | |||
=== | |||
[https://docs.google.com/document/d/1C75oUWk7Wbbo81-ldh-ogOurNjbIQ-ZLPqSQVR-hc5A/edit?usp=sharing Media API Working Docs] | [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1C75oUWk7Wbbo81-ldh-ogOurNjbIQ-ZLPqSQVR-hc5A/edit?usp=sharing Media API Working Docs] | ||
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Instead of generating large queries in the portal or with the API, it may be easier to download iDigBio data from regular dumps of all data in iDigBio. These dumps are available from [http://s.idigbio.org/idigbio-static-downloads?max-keys=10000 s.idigbio.org]. This is an S3-compatible object store (although it can be treated as a web server if that is easier) that contains .zip files of each record set in iDigBio named by recordset uuid as well as files containing all data across all records sets. | Instead of generating large queries in the portal or with the API, it may be easier to download iDigBio data from regular dumps of all data in iDigBio. These dumps are available from [http://s.idigbio.org/idigbio-static-downloads?max-keys=10000 s.idigbio.org]. This is an S3-compatible object store (although it can be treated as a web server if that is easier) that contains .zip files of each record set in iDigBio named by recordset uuid as well as files containing all data across all records sets. | ||
== Specification == | |||
The [https://github.com/idigbio/idigbio-search-api/wiki iDigBio API v2 / iDigBio Search API specification] includes detailed information about the Search API endpoints, parameters, query format, values, and returns. It is available in the github wiki associated with the [https://github.com/iDigBio/idigbio-search-api code repository]. The iDigBio Search API was released to production in June 2015. | |||
iDigBio transitioned from version 1 to version 2 (v1 to v2) of the API. All v1 endpoints and documentation should be considered deprecated, even if they continue to function. Programmers who are interested in accessing data directly in iDigBio via an API should consult the v2 API documentation. '''The v2 API is also known as the iDigBio Search API.''' | |||
The now-deprecated [[iDigBio API v1 Specification]] includes detailed information about the old v1 API endpoints, parameters, values, and returns. In most cases, the only reason to use the v1 API was to retrieve raw, unprocessed versions of a record (e.g. no iDigBio data quality enhancements) or to access previous versions of a particular record. | |||
== Examples == | |||
See [https://github.com/iDigBio/idigbio-search-api/wiki/Examples iDigBio API v2 / iDigBio Search API Examples] in the [https://github.com/iDigBio/idigbio-search-api/wiki idigbio-search-api github wiki]. | |||
== Client Libraries == | == Client Libraries == |
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