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Data Extraction

July 2009
Eric Butler

WT.gifWe are pleased to announce the general availability of our Webtrends Data Extraction API.  This v1 release is the culmination of a ton of effort of many individuals inside Webtrends, as well as the terrific support from our partners and customers who have provided feedback and suggestions during our beta process.  Thank you all for helping us reach this milestone.

 

This open, innovative API service, provides you with elegant access to your powerful Webtrends analytics data.  This is the first time we have leveraged a full beta cycle as part of our iterative development process.  It is also the first time we've reached out to our community, via this Developer Network, to solicit feedback and validate our approach.  It's been a huge win for us.

 

What's new?

Recently, we've been working on some behind the scenes governance (security and usage controls), and focusing on fixing bugs/issues.  We've also modified the HTML and CSV formats slightly to return data back in a more easy-to-consume structure, per your suggestions.  These changes, along with some additional functionality has made this API much easier to use directly within Excel, making it the only API in the industry that is powerful enough for sophisticated applications, while easy enough to also be used by everyone via Excel.

 

We've launched the formal "/v1/" version structure into the URL.  If you are using the "/beta/" request in your URL, you should switch over to "/v1/".  We'll continue to use the "/beta/" structure for future updates, so please don't use it for any production services or applications.  Please consult our documentation for the most current information on the API.

 

What's next?

We are going to continue to iterate rapidly on this Data Extraction platform.  It's already become very popular with our customers and partners as it is so easy to use.  Look for a regular maintenance release on a monthly basis, along with a 3-4 month cycle of releases that will include awesome new features.

 

We will continue to use this Developer Network for communications, ideas, and general sharing of information.  As always, please feel free to login and post questions, respond to other questions, or post ideas you have.  Your creativity and innovation is contagious.  It's all good.

0 Comments Permalink Tags: data_extraction, dx_api, open, webtrends, rest, api, web_services, powerful, elegant
Eric Butler

Hi everyone, here are a couple of updates for you on our Data Extraction (DE) API rollout.  Your comments and suggestions have been extremely helpful...keep the feedback coming...

 

Getting Close to v1

We are currently finalizing some additional functionality and fixing some issues found during this Beta process.  Our plan is to release  RC1 (release candidate) this week.

 

As we release RC1, we will start our versioning process.  We'll keep the /beta/ path open for a few weeks still to allow everyone ample time to migrate over, but we'll be introducing the /v1/ path into the request URL as the first supported version of the service.  We'll be updating our documentation accordingly.

 

New functionality

We've added some new functionality to our Data Extraction API (our reporting REST-based web services) in the past couple of weeks.  Here's a quick synopsis:

      1. Express Report Support - Based on very popular demand, Webtrends reporting data that is Express compliant and enabled will now show realtime data via the DX API. There are various method additions to support this:
        • The list report time period method shows the additional time period as "list name="Realtime"".
        • The list reports for profile method now indicates whether the report "IsRealtimeCompatible", so you know if that particular report will give you Express data.
        • And to make the request for Express data, simply use "period=current_day" in the get report data for period method.  Also now included in that response is the "LastUpdate" time stamp so you know how recently your data was updated.
      2. Support for custom time ranges - In addition to the standard "periods" of time available (eg, current_month, etc.), you can now select relative and specific custom time ranges in your request.  For example, if you'd like to select the past 7 days, starting with yesterday, you would include "start_period=current_day-7&end_period=current_day-1", or "start_period=2009m6d30&end_period=2009m7d6"
      3. New response format - HTML - We've morphed our "excel" format into a new "html" format response structure.  You can still select "format=excel" as an option, but the responses are all coming back in the new HTML format.  This gives us better control of the response, and more consistency with the structure.

     

    More coming soon

    Look for more information coming from us over the next couple of weeks.  It's all good!

    0 Comments Permalink Tags: data_extraction, web_services

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