Google Search as JSON feed

Akshay — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 08:15:59 +0000

Did you know that Google has an officially supported JSON feed of search results? Google half-way cancelled their SOAP API a while ago, but they now offer a parametrized URL that returns a JSON data set. Google says this REST approach is useful for “Flash developers, and those developers that have a need to access the AJAX Search API from other Non-Javascript environments.” This may be even simpler to use than the SOAP API. Here’s an example query:

http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/services/search/web?v=1.0&q=Paris%20Hilton

This URL format can also be adjusted to grab results from video search, book search and so on. While the URL has the word AJAX in the string and this is officially part of the Google AJAX Search API, this has nothing to do with AJAX per se, as the URL can be called from other environments, including the server side. All you need is a JSON library to parse the results (JSON means JavaScript Object Notation, though it also doesn’t require JavaScript). The Yahoo Search API already utilizes a similar approach, though it can return XML as well. The complete documentation of this Search API can be found on the Developer’s Guide of Google AJAX Search API hosted on Google Code

Stock Market Data API (Beta release)

Akshay — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 14:26:12 +0000

Stock Exchanges around the world currently publish datafeeds in CSV format. This is quite portable and easy to implement, however it cannot be directly used in your web applications without server side code. Also these official feeds are generally very expensive and affordable only by enterprise level developers. Thats where Stock Market Data (SMD) API comes in place. This simple HTTP webservice presents a snapshot of the latest stock market data in various Web 2.0 formats such as JSON, RSS, ATOM, MDDL (Market Data Definition Language – XML for Market Data) or a good old CSV. Currently SMDAPI supports NASDAQ Stock Exchange, New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and National Stock Exchange, India (NSE) but we are actively working on supporting others soon.

Please note that SMD API is currently released as Beta and is quite unstable in nature. I am still experimenting with everything from the domain name of this service (smdapi.co.cc which is a temperory one) to the API structure itself. I am also very much open to ideas which I can incorporate in this project before it officially released.

WebD » API

Google Search as JSON feed

Stock Market Data API (Beta release)