embedly-python

Python library for interacting with Embedly's API. To get started sign up for a key at embed.ly/signup.

Install

Install with Pip (recommended):

pip install embedly

Or easy_install:

easy_install Embedly

Or setuptools:

git clone git://github.com/embedly/embedly-python.git
python setup.py

Setup requires Setuptools 0.7+ or Distribute 0.6.2+ in order to take advantage of the 2to3 option. Setup will still run on earlier versions but you'll see a warning and 2to3 won't happen. Read more in the Setuptools docs

Getting Started

This library is meant to be a dead simple way to interact with the Embedly API. There are only 2 main objects, the Embedly client and the Url response model. Here is a simple example and then we will go into the objects:

>>> from embedly import Embedly
>>> client = Embedly(:key)
>>> obj = client.oembed('http://instagram.com/p/BL7ti/')
>>> obj['type']
u'photo'
>>> obj['url']
u'http://images.ak.instagram.com/media/2011/01/24/cdd759a319184cb79793506607ff5746_7.jpg'

>>> obj = client.oembed('http://instagram.com/error/error/')
>>> obj['error']
True

Embedly Client

The Embedly client is a object that takes in a key and optional User Agent and timeout parameters then handles all the interactions and HTTP requests to Embedly. To initialize the object, you'll need the key that you got when you signed up for Embedly.

>>> from embedly import Embedly
>>> client = Embedly('key')
>>> client2 = Embedly('key', 'Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; example-org;)')
>>> client3 = Embedly('key', 'Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; example-org;)', 30)
>>> client4 = Embedly('key', timeout=10, user_agent='Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; example-org;)')

The client object now has a bunch of different methods that you can use.

oembed

Corresponds to the oEmbed endpoint. Passes back an object that allows you to retrieve a title, thumbnail, description and the embed html:

>>> client.oembed('http://vimeo.com/18150336')
<embedly.models.Url at 0x10223d950>

extract

Corresponds to the Extract endpoint. Passes back an object that allows you to retrieve a title, description, content, html and a list of images.:

>>> client.extract('http://vimeo.com/18150336')
<embedly.models.Url at 0x10223d950>

preview

Preview is no longer available to new users and has been replaced by extract.

Corresponds to the Preview endpoint. Passes back a simple object that allows you to retrieve a title, description, content, html and a list of images.:

>>> client.preview('http://vimeo.com/18150336')
<embedly.models.Url at 0x10223d950>

objectify

Objectify is no longer available to new users and has been replaced by extract.

Corresponds to the Objectify endpoint. Passes back a simple object that allows you to retrieve pretty much everything that Embedly knows about a URL.:

>>> client.objectify('http://vimeo.com/18150336')
<embedly.models.Url at 0x10223d950>

The above functions all take the same arguements, a URL or a list of URLs and keyword arguments that correspond to Embedly's query arguments. Here is an example:

>>> client.oembed(['http://vimeo.com/18150336',
  'http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hD7ydlyhvKs'], maxwidth=500, words=20)

There are some supporting functions that allow you to limit URLs before sending them to Embedly. Embedly can return metadata for any URL, these just allow a developer to only pass a subset of Embedly providers. Note that URL shorteners like bit.ly or t.co are not supported through these regexes.

regex

If you would like to only send URLs that returns embed HTML via Embedly you can match the URL to the regex before making the call. The matching providers are listed at embed.ly/providers:

>>> url = 'http://vimeo.com/18150336'
>>> client.regex.match(url)

<_sre.SRE_Match at 0x1017ba718>

is_supported

This is a simplified version of regex:

>>> url = 'http://vimeo.com/18150336'
>>> client.is_supported(url)

True

Url Object

The Url object is basically a response dictionary returned from one of the Embedly API endpoints.

>>> response = client.oembed('http://vimeo.com/18150336', words=10)

Depending on the method you are using, the response will have different attributes. We will go through a few, but you should read the documentation to get the full list of data that is passed back.

>>> response['type']
u'video'
>>> response['title']
u'Wingsuit Basejumping - The Need 4 Speed: The Art of Flight'
>>> response['provider_name']
u'Vimeo'
>>> response['width']
1280

As you can see the Url object works like a dictionary, but it's slightly enhanced. It will always have method and original_url attributes, which represent the Embedly request type and the URL requested.

>>> response.method
'oembed'
>>> response.original_url
'http://vimeo.com/18150336'

# useful because the response data itself may not have a URL
# (or it could have a redirected link, querystring params, etc)
>>> response['url']
...
KeyError: 'url'

For the Preview and Objectify endpoints the sub-objects can also be accessed in the same manner.

>>> obj = client.preview('http://vimeo.com/18150336', words=10)
>>> obj['object']['type']
u'video'
>>> obj['images'][0]['url']
u'http://b.vimeocdn.com/ts/117/311/117311910_1280.jpg'

Error Handling

If there was an error processing the request, the Url object will contain an error. For example if we use an invalid key, we will get a 401 response back

>>> client = Embedly('notakey')
>>> obj = client.preview('http://vimeo.com/18150336')
>>> obj['error']
True
>>> obj['error_code']
401

Copyright

Copyright (c) 2013 Embed.ly, Inc. See LICENSE for details.