Getting started
Exploring and using data
Exploring catalogs and datasets
Exploring a catalog of datasets
What's in a dataset
Filtering data within a dataset
An introduction to the Explore API
An introduction to the Automation API
Introduction to the WFS API
Downloading a dataset
Creating maps and charts
Creating advanced charts with the Charts tool
Overview of the Maps interface
Configure your map
Manage your maps
Reorder and group layers in a map
Creating multi-layer maps
Share your map
Navigating maps made with the Maps interface
Rename and save a map
Creating pages with the Code editor
How to limit who can see your visualizations
Archiving a page
Managing a page's security
Creating a page with the Code editor
Content pages: ideas, tips & resources
How to insert internal links on a page or create a table of contents
Sharing and embedding a content page
How to troubleshoot maps that are not loading correctly
Creating content with Studio
Creating content with Studio
Adding a page
Publishing a page
Editing the page layout
Configuring blocks
Previewing a page
Adding text
Adding a chart
Adding an image block to a Studio page
Adding a map block in Studio
Adding a key performance indicator (KPI)
Configuring page information
Using filters to enhance your pages
Refining data
Managing page access
How to edit the url of a Studio page
Visualizations
Managing saved visualizations
Configuring the calendar visualization
The basics of dataset visualizations
Configuring the images visualization
Configuring the custom view
Configuring the table visualization
Configuring the map visualization
Understanding automatic clustering in maps
Configuring the analyze visualization
Publishing data
Publishing datasets
Creating a dataset
Creating a dataset from a file
Creating a dataset with multiple files
Creating a dataset with media files
Creating a dataset by connecting to a remote service
Federating an Opendatasoft dataset
Publishing a dataset
Publishing data from a CSV file
Publishing data in JSON format
Supported file formats
Configuring datasets
Automated removal of records
Configuring dataset export
Checking dataset history
Configuring the tooltip
Dataset actions and statuses
Dataset limits
Defining a dataset schema
How Opendatasoft manages dates
How to find your workspace's IP address
Keeping data up to date
Processing data
Translating a dataset
Deciding what license is best for your dataset
Types of source files
OpenStreetMap files
Shapefiles
JSON files
XML files
Spreadsheet files
RDF files
CSV files
MapInfo files
GeoJSON files
KML/KMZ files
GeoPackage
Connectors
Saving and sharing connections
Airtable connector
Amazon S3 connector
ArcGIS connector
Azure Blob storage connector
Database connector
Dataset of datasets (workspace) connector
Eco Counter connector
Feed connector
Google BigQuery connector
Google Drive connector
How to find the Open Agenda API Key and the Open Agenda URL
JCDecaux connector
Netatmo connector
OpenAgenda connector
Realtime connector
Salesforce connector
SharePoint connector
U.S. Census connector
WFS connector
Harvesters
Harvesting a catalog
ArcGIS harvester
ArcGIS Hub Portals harvester
CKAN harvester
CSW harvester
FTP with meta CSV harvester
Opendatasoft Federation harvester
Quandl harvester
Socrata harvester
data.gouv.fr harvester
data.json harvester
Processors
What is a processor and how to use one
Add a field processor
Compute geo distance processor
Concatenate text processor
Convert degrees processor
Copy a field processor
Correct geo shape processor
Create geo point processor
Decode HTML entities processor
Decode a Google polyline processor
Deduplicate multivalued fields processor
Delete record processor
Expand JSON array processor
Expand multivalued field processor
Expression processor
Extract HTML processor
Extract URLs processor
Extract bit range processor
Extract from JSON processor
Extract text processor
File processor
GeoHash to GeoJSON processor
GeoJoin processor
Geocode with ArcGIS processor
Geocode with BAN processor (France)
Geocode with PDOK processor
Geocode with the Census Bureau processor (United States)
Geomasking processor
Get coordinates from a three-word address processor
IP address to geo Coordinates processor
JSON array to multivalued processor
Join datasets processor
Meta expression processor
Nominatim geocoder processor
Normalize Projection Reference processor
Normalize URL processor
Normalize Unicode values processor
Normalize date processor
Polygon filtering processor
Replace text processor
Replace via regular expression processor
Retrieve Administrative Divisions processor
Set timezone processor
Simplify Geo Shape processor
Skip records processor
Split text processor
Transform boolean columns to multivalued field processor
Transpose columns to rows processor
WKT and WKB to GeoJson processor
what3words processor
Data Collection Form
About the Data Collection Form feature
Data Collection Forms associated with your Opendatasoft workspace
Create and manage your data collection forms
Sharing and moderating your data collection forms
Dataset metadata
Analyzing how your data is used
Getting involved: Sharing, Reusing and Reacting
Discovering & submitting data reuses
Sharing through social networks
Commenting via Disqus
Downloading datasets
Submitting feedback
Following dataset updates
Sharing and embedding data visualizations
Monitoring usage
Monitoring your workspaces
Analyzing user activity
Analyzing actions (API calls)
Analyzing source data
Analyzing data usage
Analyzing a single dataset with its monitoring dashboard
Analyzing back office activity
Using the data lineage feature
Managing your users
Managing limits
Managing users
Managing users
Setting quotas for individual users
Managing access requests
Inviting users to the portal
Managing workspaces
Managing your portal
Configuring your portal
Configure catalog and dataset pages
Configuring a shared catalog
Sharing, reusing, communicating
Customizing your workspace's URL
Managing legal information
Connect Google Analytics (GA4)
Regional settings
Pictograms reference
Managing tracking
Look & Feel
Branding your portal
Customizing portal themes
How to customize my portal according to the current language
Managing the dataset themes
Configuring data visualizations
Configuring the navigation
Adding assets
Plans and quotas
Managing security
Configuring your portal's general security policy
A dataset's Security tab
Single sign-on with OpenID Connect
Single sign-on with SAML
Parameters
- Home
- Exploring and using data
- Exploring catalogs and datasets
- An introduction to the Automation API
An introduction to the Automation API
Updated
by Coralie Loheac
An API, or Application Programming Interface, is a tool designed to allow different software systems to communicate with each other. Opendatasoft provides several different APIs to interact with the platform, but Opendatasoft's Automation API can be very useful to automate your data governance processes and make sure the data published on your portal is always up to date.
What the Automation API allows you to do
Opendatasoft's Automation API allows you to perform all of the actions available in a workspace's back office. Below is a non-exhaustive list of those actions:
- Add data to Opendatasoft: Connect to your remote services, harvest another portal of federate Opendatasoft Hub.
- Enrich your data: Describe your datasets using metadata, or add one of the many available data processors.
- Publish your data: Publish a dataset on your portal, manage update schedules to keep your data fresh.
- Handle your pages: Create and manage Studio and Code editor pages.
- Manage your domain: Handle users and groups.
- New connectors (Sharepoint, Google Drive, Azure Blob Storage, Amazon S3 etc.)
- Saved connections management
- Federation from Opendatasoft Hub datasets
- Metadata templates
Authenticating to the API
Using the Automation API requires you to be authenticated as an Opendatasoft user. Two options are possible:
- An API key in the query's header (recommended).
API headers are like an extra source of information for each API call you make. Their job is to contain the meta-data associated with an API request and its response. To use this, provide an API key that exists for your Opendatasoft workspace in the "Authorization" headers, as follows:apikey
<yourapikey>
- An API key in the query string (not as secure), as in:
<your query>?apikey=<yourapikey>
Interacting with the API
So, how do you actually go about using the API? As we saw above, using the API consists of asking it for something, and getting an answer in return. In API-speak, you make a "call" or "request" and receive, in this case, a JSON object in return.
So when you use the API, your API call is sent to the Opendatasoft server, and is answered with a JSON object.
You'll want to use other tools to make interacting with the API more practical and useful. For example, API calls can be made using platforms such as Postman that are made to interact with APIs. If you're a developer, you can use Curl or Python's Requests library.
https://<yourdomainid>.opendatasoft.com/api/automation/v1.0/datasets?apikey=<yourapikey>
.Replace the
<yourdomainid>
and <yourapikey>
variables with the appropriate values. (See here for more information about generating API keys.)What you should see is a JSON object containing a list of your domain's datasets, with links to further JSON objects. That's the API in action! Of course, on its own, this isn't very interesting. But used with other tools, the API can be a powerful way of interacting with your data.
What next?
Hopefully this page helps explain how the Automation API can be useful to you.
No doubt using an API isn't for everyone. But with a little work, the API can allow you to easily publish data on your portal.
To assist you along the way, we invite you to dive into our documentation for the for the Automation API v1.