Python API for Flickr Services - Part I

These days I am working on a facebook application that mashes up servises from Facebook and Flickr. The application is hosted by Google Appengine and I am developing on Django web application framework.

Flickr has an easy to use API which is called Flickr Services. Here are some interesting things you can do with the Flickr Services:

• You can upload photos from anywhere (web application, desktop application or mobile application)
  
• You can search for images. Flickr Services lets you search images by
  - tags
  - geo location
  - photo taken time / photo upload time
  - and more...
  
• execute methods that require authentication
  - create, edit, remove tags
  - create, edit, remove photo sets
  - replace, remove photos
  

There are two Python APIs listed in the Flickr Services page:

1. http://www.stuvel.eu/projects/flickrapi
   
2. http://code.google.com/p/flickrpy/
   

I have implemented Flickr services in Python. Don't think this as "reinventing the wheel" because it was a coding practice for me. Plus, i have my own, customized, shortcut methods ;)

You can download the library from http://code.google.com/p/ilkinulassandbox/. There are also some other javascript and python code snippets there.

Here is a basic usage of the API:

>>> import flickr
>>> api = flickr.FlickrAPI('API_KEY','SECRET_KEY')
>>> api.search({'tags':'python', 'per_page':'3'})
{'photos': {'page': 1,
            'pages': 8326,
            'perpage': 3,
            'photo': [{'farm': 4,
                       'id': '3911963732',
                       'isfamily': 0,
                       'isfriend': 0,
                       'ispublic': 1,
                       'owner': '30041312@N03',
                       'secret': '44aae23e98',
                       'server': '3090',
                       'title': 'Centralian Carpet Python (Apophis)'},
                      {'farm': 3,
                       'id': '3911184515',
                       'isfamily': 0,
                       'isfriend': 0,
                       'ispublic': 1,
                       'owner': '30041312@N03',
                       'secret': '0aae3c8127',
                       'server': '2513',
                       'title': 'Centralian Carpet Python (Apophis)'},
                      {'farm': 3,
                       'id': '3911127131',
                       'isfamily': 0,
                       'isfriend': 0,
                       'ispublic': 1,
                       'owner': '31355375@N02',
                       'secret': '2921fea364',
                       'server': '2564',
                       'title': 'Sendra Python Nails 122 01'}],
            'total': '24977'},
 'stat': 'ok'}

Methods of the API returns a dictionary instance. Caller must handle the returned result.

>>> result = api.search({'tags':'python', 'per_page':'3'})
>>> result['photos']['photo'][0]['id']
'3911751961'

Flickr photo url construction is described here in details. You can easily get the url of a returned photo search result by using build_photo_url. Default image size is 'm' which means 'normal'

>>> api.build_photo_url(result['photos']['photo'][0])
'http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3462/3911751961_43d409cf7c_m.jpg'
>>> api.build_photo_url(result['photos']['photo'][1], size='s')
'http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2613/3911666353_ac0cc98871_s.jpg'

Lets search for pictures tagged 'fun' around point (lat=41.070293, lon=28.24894)

>>> pictures = api.search({'lat':'41.034046', 'lon':'28.980217', 'radius':'10', 'radius_units':'km','tags':'fun'})
>>> api.build_photo_url(fun_pictures['photos']['photo'][20])
'http://farm1.static.flickr.com/116/293251976_ce5337908d_m.jpg'

The next post of "Python API for Flickr Services" will show how you can call methods that require authentication. For the curious readers the api is ready http://code.google.com/p/ilkinulassandbox/. But it lacks documentation :(


NOTE : I use this python API in my facebook application "Türkiye'yi ne kadar iyi tanıyorsun?". Application is a simple guessing game. You see a geo tagged picture from flickr and you answer which city this picture belongs.

UPDATE : This library returns native Python datatypes rather than XML trees or unparsed JSON, which the other Flickr APIs have a tendency to do. (Thanks martian)