3 ms·

If Data You Have, Consume It They Will

71 points by paulhallett 12y ago

anonfunction 12y ago
Really great blog post with a great message and composition. As a testament to the theme I wrote an API over a weekend that returned ebola data and it has been very heavily used by people around the world. The astounding thing is that the World Health Organization, from whom I gathered the data, only offered it at the time in the form of PDF files. It's all open source if anyone's interested: https://github.com/montanaflynn/ebola-outbreak-api https://github.com/montanaflynn/ebola-outbreak-api
- paulhallett 12y ago
  This is awesome, and another great example that "If you provide data, people will consume it"!
- pm90 12y ago
  Doesn't it cost you to host your server and data somewhere? That's not mentioned in the blog post, but I would love to get a ballpark figure for how much $$'s are going out every month to provide this service
trebor 12y ago
I noticed a typo you might want to correct: a cannon is quite different from a canon. One is a weapon, the other is not.
- paulhallett 12y ago
  Ah thanks! It would be far more exciting if it was the weapon though...
  - kragniz 12y ago
    http://xkcd.com/1401/ http://xkcd.com/1401/ More seriously, great post! I also enjoyed your talk at pycon.ie this year.
    - paulhallett 12y ago
      Oh wow you were there? Thanks!
- Disruptive_Dave 12y ago
  Or is it.... :)
- hobs 12y ago
  Another one I noticed: also have a "Here's a chat of the requests for each day". (chart).
  - paulhallett 12y ago
    Bloody markdown and no spell checker. I rely on them far too much, thank you
drcomputer 12y ago
This makes me happy. :) http://i.imgur.com/d6OZWX7.jpg http://i.imgur.com/d6OZWX7.jpg
basicallydan 12y ago
Hey Paul! It's Dan from London API! So glad to hear you're doing this. I wanna help out with SWAPI, if I get time :) FYI everybody who maybe didn't read it in the blog post: Paul's API is now used by the UK Organisation Code Club when teaching schoolkids how to use python. They're given a task to create a Pokédex using this API and a python wrapper. I was extremely surprised when I saw my kids using it! Good job, dude!
valarauca1 12y ago
Oh wow there is an easily querable pokemon API. Now I feel like a dick for manually scrapping that data from fan sites :\
jnoland 12y ago
Awesome blog post! I am definitely inspired to create an open API for something. Still deciding on what. Thanks.
neuralk 12y ago
The definitive word on the Star Wars canon was given earlier this year: only the six films, Star Wars: The Clone Wars series, Star Wars: Rebels, and new content are considered canon. Also, Wookiepedia is doing an excellent job differentiating Canon and Legends, so you can take your cues from there.

71 points by paulhallett 12y ago

Really great blog post with a great message and composition. As a testament to the theme I wrote an API over a weekend that returned ebola data and it has been very heavily used by people around the world. The astounding thing is that the World Health Organization, from whom I gathered the data, only offered it at the time in the form of PDF files. It's all open source if anyone's interested: https://github.com/montanaflynn/ebola-outbreak-api https://github.com/montanaflynn/ebola-outbreak-api

paulhallett 12y ago
This is awesome, and another great example that "If you provide data, people will consume it"!
pm90 12y ago
Doesn't it cost you to host your server and data somewhere? That's not mentioned in the blog post, but I would love to get a ballpark figure for how much $$'s are going out every month to provide this service

trebor 12y ago

I noticed a typo you might want to correct: a cannon is quite different from a canon. One is a weapon, the other is not.

paulhallett 12y ago
Ah thanks! It would be far more exciting if it was the weapon though...
- kragniz 12y ago
  http://xkcd.com/1401/ http://xkcd.com/1401/ More seriously, great post! I also enjoyed your talk at pycon.ie this year.
  - paulhallett 12y ago
    Oh wow you were there? Thanks!
Disruptive_Dave 12y ago
Or is it.... :)
hobs 12y ago
Another one I noticed: also have a "Here's a chat of the requests for each day". (chart).
- paulhallett 12y ago
  Bloody markdown and no spell checker. I rely on them far too much, thank you

drcomputer 12y ago

This makes me happy. :) http://i.imgur.com/d6OZWX7.jpg http://i.imgur.com/d6OZWX7.jpg

basicallydan 12y ago

Hey Paul! It's Dan from London API! So glad to hear you're doing this. I wanna help out with SWAPI, if I get time :) FYI everybody who maybe didn't read it in the blog post: Paul's API is now used by the UK Organisation Code Club when teaching schoolkids how to use python. They're given a task to create a Pokédex using this API and a python wrapper. I was extremely surprised when I saw my kids using it! Good job, dude!

valarauca1 12y ago

Oh wow there is an easily querable pokemon API. Now I feel like a dick for manually scrapping that data from fan sites :\

jnoland 12y ago

Awesome blog post! I am definitely inspired to create an open API for something. Still deciding on what. Thanks.

neuralk 12y ago

The definitive word on the Star Wars canon was given earlier this year: only the six films, Star Wars: The Clone Wars series, Star Wars: Rebels, and new content are considered canon. Also, Wookiepedia is doing an excellent job differentiating Canon and Legends, so you can take your cues from there.