Question

I’m just messing around with the Factual API but I don’t fully understand how to represent a URL as a get request. The following is the URL I want to turn into a jQuery get:

http://api.factual.com/v2/tables/7HOTBC/read?APIKey=SoX1rlj4x8VfRfvqnnehVH5ObpkHJc0kIzloTtxor5gyrHG5c3EySCTTcErCyRYO&filters={"category":{"$bw":"Arts%2C%20Entertainment%20%26%20Nightlife%20%3E%20Bars"},"latitude":{"$blank":false},"longitude":{"$blank":false},"$search":["London"],"$loc":{"$within_dist":[51.5149943,-0.0638818,1000]}}

This is the code I have written to do this:

    var factualKey = "SoX1rlj4x8VfRfvqnnehVH5ObpkHJc0kIzloTtxor5gyrHG5c3EySCTTcErCyRYO";

    $(document).ready(function(){

        // initialise google maps
        initializeGoogleMaps();

        // make a get request to the factual api
        $.get(
                "http://api.factual.com/v2/tables/7HOTBC/read",
                { APIKey : factualKey,
                  filters : { category : { $bw : "Arts, Entertainment & Nightlife > Bars" },
                              latitude : { $blank : false },
                              longitude : { $blank : false },
                              $search : "[\"London\"]",
                              $loc : { $within_dist : [51.5149943,-0.0638818,1000] }
                  }
                },
                function(responseData){
                    alert("SUCCESS");
                },
                "json"
        );
    });

When I look in firebug this is what the address of my request has come out like:

http://api.factual.com/v2/tables/7HOTBC/read?APIKey=SoX1rlj4x8VfRfvqnnehVH5ObpkHJc0kIzloTtxor5gyrHG5c3EySCTTcErCyRYO&filters[category][%24bw]=Arts%2C+Entertainment+%26+Nightlife+%3E+Bars&filters[latitude][%24blank]=false&filters[longitude][%24blank]=false&filters[%24search]=[%22London%22]&filters[%24loc][%24within_dist][]=51.5149943&filters[%24loc][%24within_dist][]=-0.0638818&filters[%24loc][%24within_dist][]=1000

…which is obviously wrong!

And here’s the response from the Factual API:

{"version":"2","status":"error","error":"Your filters parameter cannot be parsed. Please see http:\/\/wiki.developer.factual.com\/Server-API for documentation.","error_type":"Api::Error::InvalidArgument"}

Can someone tell me what I haven’t done properly in my code? Am I meant to encode the data I’m passing as part of the get request? Or is it something I’ve missed?

Answer 1

Here’s how I got a successful querystring using your object.

$.param({ APIKey : factualKey,
          filters : JSON.stringify({ category : { $bw : "Arts, Entertainment & Nightlife > Bars" },
                      latitude : { $blank : false },
                      longitude : { $blank : false },
                      $search : "[\"London\"]",
                      $loc : { $within_dist : [51.5149943,-0.0638818,1000] }
          })
});

Same as what you’re doing, except that I JSON.stringify the filters, and $.param the entire thing.

Not sure if the $.param is needed. Could be that jQuery does it.

Also not sure if you’ll hit same origin policy issues.