Comments on: Open Science, H1N1, Processing, and the Google Spreadsheet API

By: blprnt

blprnt — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 17:51:43 +0000

Hi Tony,

From what I've tested quickly it doesn't seem to work without authenticating – I'm not sure why this is or if there's a way to avoid it. I threw the code together pretty quickly to suit a specific project; if and when it becomes a library I would look into it a bit deeper…

By: psychemedia

psychemedia — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 15:52:33 +0000

Looking at your code, you have an init() function that takes user credentials; public spreadsheets will emit data without the need for credentials; do you have a function that grabs data from these simple spreadsheets with requiring the provision of Google authentication details?

maybe fetchSheetByKey() works without the prior init()? (I don't have processing handy so can't try just at the mo:-(

By: blprnt

blprnt — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 16:41:50 +0000

Hi Phillip,

I haven't tried to integrate Google Spreadsheets with flash (yet) but there's no reason why it wouldn't be possible. The tricky part would be handling authentication, but there should be a pile of libraries for that.

By: Philipp

Philipp — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 14:13:54 +0000

Thanks! I always wanted to use spreadsheets in Flash infographics. Do you have experience with that?

By: blprnt

blprnt — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 23:16:58 +0000

Hi Phillip – I just switched servers and in my over-zealous file culling L removed the .zip file by accident. It's back there now!

By: Philipp

Philipp — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 09:57:22 +0000

Hi,
It seems the SpreadSheetSample.zip is no longer on server.

Thanks for this post!

By: blprnt

blprnt — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 16:30:48 +0000

Thanks, Tony. I like what you are working on with the charts API. Your approach allows for very rapid exploration of the data, which is certainly very useful.

My post is mostly concerned with the next step - how Processing or OF or similar tools could be used to create novel, non-standard visualizations well as tools to process/filter/manipulate the data.

I think that the Google APIs and their underlying infrastructure would provide a perfect base for large data projects, wether they be scientific, governmental, or personal. It would certainly be a good step towards standardization, which seems to be a key part of realizing the dream of truly open data.

I don't know that much about the mechanics of Google Spreadsheets & the Google Data APIs, but considering it's Google I'd have to guess that the APIs could probably handle pretty much anything we could throw at them. It would be interesting to come up with some ideas to test some of these concepts out on a bigger scale.

When the Guardian APIs were launched in the Spring I found what the Data Store was doing to be the most interesting part - I think it has just taken everyone a few months to start to explore and build tools. It certainly provides a very interesting model for how similar initiatives could be constructed.

By: psychemedia

psychemedia — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 10:23:53 +0000

Great example of how to use the Google spreadsheets API with Processing; I started looking at it from the point of view of the Google charts API:
http://ouseful.wordpress.com/2009/05/22/first-s...

With so many data projects opening up at the moment, I've come round to thinking that it would be handy if they implemented the Google API. Do you have any thoughts about that? eg whether it would be a good think, or bad thing; what the risks might be; whether the API is up to it; and so on?