Flickraw ↑

Flickraw is a library to access flickr api in a simple way. It maps exactly the methods described in the official api documentation. It also tries to present the data returned in a simple and intuitive way. The methods are fetched from flickr when loading the library by using introspection capabilities. So it is always up-to-date with regards to new methods added by flickr.

The github repository: github.com/hanklords/flickraw

Installation ↑

Type this in a console (you might need to be superuser)

gem install json (This is only necessary on ruby 1.8)
gem install flickraw

This will recreate the documentation by fetching the methods descriptions from flickr and then virtually plugging them in standard rdoc documentation.

$ cd flickraw
$ rake rdoc

Features ↑

Usage ↑

Simple ↑

require 'flickraw'

FlickRaw.api_key="... Your API key ..."
FlickRaw.shared_secret="... Your shared secret ..."

list   = flickr.photos.getRecent

id     = list[0].id
secret = list[0].secret
info = flickr.photos.getInfo :photo_id => id, :secret => secret

puts info.title           # => "PICT986"
puts info.dates.taken     # => "2006-07-06 15:16:18"

sizes = flickr.photos.getSizes :photo_id => id

original = sizes.find {|s| s.label == 'Original' }
puts original.width       # => "800" -- may fail if they have no original marked image

Authentication ↑

require 'flickraw'

FlickRaw.api_key="... Your API key ..."
FlickRaw.shared_secret="... Your shared secret ..."

token = flickr.get_request_token
auth_url = flickr.get_authorize_url(token['oauth_token'], :perms => 'delete')

puts "Open this url in your process to complete the authication process : #{auth_url}"
puts "Copy here the number given when you complete the process."
verify = gets.strip

begin
  flickr.get_access_token(token['oauth_token'], token['oauth_token_secret'], verify)
  login = flickr.test.login
  puts "You are now authenticated as #{login.username} with token #{flickr.access_token} and secret #{flickr.access_secret}"
rescue FlickRaw::FailedResponse => e
  puts "Authentication failed : #{e.msg}"
end

If the user has already been authenticated, you can reuse the access token and access secret:

require 'flickraw'

FlickRaw.api_key="... Your API key ..."
FlickRaw.shared_secret="... Your shared secret ..."

flickr.access_token = "... Your access token ..."
flickr.access_secret = "... Your access secret ..."

# From here you are logged:
login = flickr.test.login
puts "You are now authenticated as #{login.username}"

If you need to have several users authenticated at the same time in your application (ex: a public web application) you need to create separate FlickRaw objects since it keeps the authentication data internally.

flickr = FlickRaw::Flickr.new

Upload ↑

require 'flickraw'

FlickRaw.api_key="... Your API key ..."
FlickRaw.shared_secret="... Your shared secret ..."

PHOTO_PATH='photo.jpg'

# You need to be authentified to do that, see the previous examples.
flickr.upload_photo PHOTO_PATH, :title => "Title", :description => "This is the description"

Proxy ↑

require 'flickraw'
FlickRaw.proxy = "http://user:pass@proxy.example.com:3129/"

Secure endpoints ↑

https endpoints are used by default. If you want to use unencrypted endpoints :

require 'flickraw'
FlickRaw.secure = false

Flickr URL Helpers ↑

There are some helpers to build flickr urls :

url, url_m, url_s, url_t, url_b, url_z, url_q, url_n, url_c, url_o ↑

info = flickr.photos.getInfo(:photo_id => "3839885270")
FlickRaw.url_b(info) # => "https://farm3.static.flickr.com/2485/3839885270_6fb8b54e06_b.jpg"

url_profile ↑

info = flickr.photos.getInfo(:photo_id => "3839885270")
FlickRaw.url_profile(info) # => "https://www.flickr.com/people/41650587@N02/"

url_photopage ↑

info = flickr.photos.getInfo(:photo_id => "3839885270")
FlickRaw.url_photopage(info) # => "https://www.flickr.com/photos/41650587@N02/3839885270"

url_photoset, url_photosets ↑

info = flickr.photos.getInfo(:photo_id => "3839885270")
FlickRaw.url_photosets(info) # => "https://www.flickr.com/photos/41650587@N02/sets/"

url_short, url_short_m, url_short_s, url_short_t ↑

info = flickr.photos.getInfo(:photo_id => "3839885270")
FlickRaw.url_short(info) # => "https://flic.kr/p/6Rjq7s"

url_photostream ↑

info = flickr.photos.getInfo(:photo_id => "3839885270")
FlickRaw.url_photostream(info) # => "https://www.flickr.com/photos/41650587@N02/"

See the examples directory to find more examples.

Cached version ↑

You can use

require 'flickraw-cached'

instead of

require 'flickraw'

This way it it doesn't fetch available flickr methods each time it is loaded. The flickraw-cached gem is on rubygems.org and should be up-to-date with regard to flickr api most of the time.