The Socrata Java API

So you like transparency. You're like the glass window of government agencies. You're like the invisible man of public servants.

HOWEVER...

It sure would be nice if someone could provide an API for publishing and accessing your agency's data on their socrata platform.

Booyakasha!

Example (Everyone loves examples)

Creating a dataset

Connection c = new HttpConnection("robots.dod.gov", "sam.gibson@socrata.com", "******", "******");
View v = new View();
v.setName("Robotic Attack Units by Year");
v.setDescription("Seriously? You need more of a description than that?");
View.Column unit = new View.Column();
unit.setName("Unit");
unit.setDataTypeName("text");

View.Column year = new View.Column();
year.setName("Year");
year.setDataTypeName("number");

v.addColumn(unit);
v.addColumn(year);

v.create(c);

Importing a file into a dataset

// Setup the view with the columns that you want
// [...]
Connection c = new HttpConnection("robots.dod.gov", "sam.gibson@socrata.com", "******", "******");
v.create(new File("/Users/sam/Desktop/robots.csv"), conn);

Appending to an existing dataset

Connection c = new HttpConnection("robots.dod.gov", "sam.gibson@socrata.com", "******", "******");
View v = View.find("robo-tics", conn);
v.append(new File("/Users/sam/Desktop/super-secret-robots.csv"), conn);

Replacing the rows in an existing dataset

Connection c = new HttpConnection("robots.dod.gov", "sam.gibson@socrata.com", "******", "******");
View v = View.find("robo-tics", conn);
v.replace(new File("/Users/sam/Desktop/snidely-whiplash-robots.csv"), conn);

Publishing a dataset

Connection c = new HttpConnection("robots.dod.gov", "sam.gibson@socrata.com", "******", "******");
View v = View.find("robo-tics", conn);
View newlypublished = v.publish(conn);

Creating an editable copy of a dataset

Connection c = new HttpConnection("robots.dod.gov", "sam.gibson@socrata.com", "******", "******");
View v = View.find("robo-tics", conn);
View newlyeditable = v.copy(conn);
// [...] perform some edit operation on it.

Retrieving a single row

Connection c = new HttpConnection("facilities.doe.gov", "clint.tseng@socrata.com", "******", "******");
View v = View.find("faci-ltes", conn);
View.Row r = v.getRow(1);

// let's see what's in the first column
Column col = v.getColumns().get(0);
Object value = r.getDataField(col);

Retrieving multiple rows

Connection c = new HttpConnection("facilities.doe.gov", "clint.tseng@socrata.com", "******", "******");
View v = View.find("faci-ltes", conn);

// get the first 200 rows
List<View.Row> r = v.getRows(0, 200, c);

Creating a row

Connection c = new HttpConnection("facilities.doe.gov", "clint.tseng@socrata.com", "******", "******");
View v = View.find("faci-ltes", conn);

Column col = v.getColumnById(128583);

View.Row r = new View.Row();
r.putDataField(col, "Test value");
v.appendRow(r);

Updating or deleting a row

Connection c = new HttpConnection("facilities.doe.gov", "clint.tseng@socrata.com", "******", "******");
View v = View.find("faci-ltes", conn);
View.Row r = v.getRow(1);

r.putDataField(v.getColumns().get(0), 3.14159);
r.update(c);

r.delete(c);