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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<title>SDMX REST API documentation</title>
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="css/baseline.compress.css" />
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="css/site.css" />
<style type="text/css">
strong.note {
background-color: yellow;
}
em.note {
<!--background-color: ;-->
}
</style>
<script type="text/javascript">
var svn_id = "$Id: index.html 107 2010-10-20 22:18:15Z Fix_J $";
var svn_rev = "$Rev: 107 $";
</script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/jquery-1.4.2.min.js"><!-- // --></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="js/site.js"><!-- // --></script>
</head>
<body>
<div id="page">
<div class="column width4 first">
<h1 class="mainhead">SDMX REST API documentation</h1>
<h1 class="subhead">
<span class="selected">→Home</span>
<a class="menu" href="examples.html"><span class="arrow">→</span><span class="unselected">Examples</span></a>
<a class="menu" href="reference.html"><span class="arrow">→</span><span class="unselected">Reference</span></a>
<a class="menu" href="playground.html"><span class="arrow">→</span><span class="unselected">Playground</span></a>
</h1>
<div id="sect1">
<p>This little project is intended as a very small contribution to the
<a href="http://unstats.un.org/unsd/wsd/">World Statistics Day</a>, 20/10/2010.</p>
<h2>What this is about</h2>
<p>The OECD exposes a very interesting and rich <a href="http://tomayko.com/writings/rest-to-my-wife">RESTful</a>
<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Application_programming_interface">API</a> (application programming interface)
that returns SDMX data. <a href="http://sdmx.org/">SDMX</a>
is an international XML-based standard for the exchange of statistical data. Unfortunately,
I couldn't find any official information about this programming interface. On the plus side,
this interface almost auto-documents itself (although I may be exaggerating a bit here) and can
be used for reference information.</p>
<p>The goal of this mini-site is to be a first step towards a fully documented SDMX API. It
doesn't make any claim on being exhaustive, reliable, offical, etc.</p>
<p>Note: This is a personal initiative and is not related to my day job (although I do work at the OECD).</p>
</div>
<div id="sect2">
<h2>Todo list</h2>
<p>As can be seen from the lists below, this is only just the beginning of what could become
a very powerful way to expose the OECD's data to a very technical and knowledgable public,
web developers.</p>
<div class="column width2 first">
<h3>missing things</h3>
<ul>
<li><strong class="note">provide JSON</strong>: XML is great, unfortunately due to security constraints
it must come from the same domain
as the application which requires additional techniques (such as a local proxy as used for this website)
to be put in place. JSON does not have this drawback
<em class="note">This is something the OECD should provide to make work easier for outside developers.</em></li>
<li><strong class="note">provide absolute values</strong>: when working with the unemployment figures (<span class="code">UNEMP</span>),
I've noticed that its description says something like <strong>"in '000"</strong>. However, this is difficult to parse
and it would be easier for the external developer to simply have the absolute values and then convert
or present them in a manner that's appropriate for their application or website. <em class="note">This is also something
that only the SDMX backend maintainer can provide.</em></li>
<li><strong class="note">a more polished framework</strong>: helper methods to translate the codes to their
French or English equivalent; more options for the different outputs (language, format, layout, ...);
more outputs (not just tables, charts, sparklines), csv, wiki, ...;
output status codes where appropriate;
error handling</li>
<li><strong class="note">an interactive sandbox</strong>: it's coming, it's just not ready yet,
see <a href="playground.html">Playground</a></li>
<li><strong class="note">access control</strong>: as with all APIs, a way to limit access to
the data and to follow up on usage patterns to improve the API, some kind of authentication,
typically via tokens should be put in place.</li>
</ul>
</div>
<div class="column width2 ">
<h3>stuff that works</h3>
<ul>
<li>a basic framework of <strong class="note">four different outputs</strong>:
<ul>
<li><a href="examples.html#single">single values</a>, </li>
<li><a href="examples.html#spark">sparklines</a>, </li>
<li><a href="examples.html#table">tables</a>, </li>
<li><a href="examples.html#chart">charts</a>.</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>a valid and working <strong class="note">embed</strong> approach
(see <a href="examples.html#embed">embed this!</a>)</li>
<li>a basic <strong class="note"><a href="reference.html">reference</a></strong>
of the methods that have been
found by trial and error</li>
</ul>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="width4 column first" style="text-align:right; color:white;"><em>Yet another major success!</em> - <span id="svn_id"></span></div>
</body>
</html>