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fdbae010 | 1 | Python Twitter Tools |
a65893e4 | 2 | ==================== |
fdbae010 | 3 | |
9ae71d46 | 4 | [![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/sixohsix/twitter.svg)](https://travis-ci.org/sixohsix/twitter) |
5 | ||
f1a8ed67 | 6 | The Minimalist Twitter API for Python is a Python API for Twitter, |
7 | everyone's favorite Web 2.0 Facebook-style status updater for people | |
8 | on the go. | |
fdbae010 | 9 | |
f1a8ed67 | 10 | Also included is a twitter command-line tool for getting your friends' |
11 | tweets and setting your own tweet from the safety and security of your | |
5b8b1ead | 12 | favorite shell and an IRC bot that can announce Twitter updates to an |
f1a8ed67 | 13 | IRC channel. |
fdbae010 | 14 | |
5f47b302 | 15 | For more information, after installing the `twitter` package: |
fdbae010 | 16 | |
17 | * import the `twitter` package and run help() on it | |
18 | * run `twitter -h` for command-line tool help | |
a65893e4 | 19 | |
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20 | |
21 | twitter - The Command-Line Tool | |
22 | ------------------------------- | |
a65893e4 | 23 | |
30913a4e | 24 | The command-line tool lets you do some awesome things: |
a65893e4 | 25 | |
30913a4e | 26 | * view your tweets, recent replies, and tweets in lists |
a65893e4 MV |
27 | * view the public timeline |
28 | * follow and unfollow (leave) friends | |
29 | * various output formats for tweet information | |
51e0b8f1 | 30 | |
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31 | The bottom line: type `twitter`, receive tweets. |
32 | ||
33 | ||
34 | ||
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35 | twitterbot - The IRC Bot |
36 | ------------------------ | |
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37 | |
38 | The IRC bot is associated with a twitter account (either your own account or an | |
39 | account you create for the bot). The bot announces all tweets from friends | |
40 | it is following. It can be made to follow or leave friends through IRC /msg | |
41 | commands. | |
42 | ||
5f47b302 | 43 | |
5f47b302 | 44 | twitter-log |
51e0b8f1 | 45 | ----------- |
5f47b302 MV |
46 | |
47 | `twitter-log` is a simple command-line tool that dumps all public | |
48 | tweets from a given user in a simple text format. It is useful to get | |
49 | a complete offsite backup of all your tweets. Run `twitter-log` and | |
50 | read the instructions. | |
51 | ||
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52 | twitter-archiver and twitter-follow |
53 | ----------------------------------- | |
54 | ||
55 | twitter-archiver will log all the tweets posted by any user since they | |
56 | started posting. twitter-follow will print a list of all of all the | |
57 | followers of a user (or all the users that user follows). | |
58 | ||
5f47b302 | 59 | |
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60 | Programming with the Twitter api classes |
61 | ======================================== | |
62 | ||
63 | ||
64 | The Twitter and TwitterStream classes are the key to building your own | |
65 | Twitter-enabled applications. | |
66 | ||
67 | ||
68 | The Twitter class | |
69 | ----------------- | |
70 | ||
71 | The minimalist yet fully featured Twitter API class. | |
72 | ||
73 | Get RESTful data by accessing members of this class. The result | |
74 | is decoded python objects (lists and dicts). | |
75 | ||
76 | The Twitter API is documented at: | |
77 | ||
5d5d68cc | 78 | **[http://dev.twitter.com/doc](http://dev.twitter.com/doc)** |
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79 | |
80 | ||
81 | Examples:: | |
82 | ||
bcbd4e2b | 83 | ```python |
814d84f5 | 84 | from twitter import * |
51e0b8f1 | 85 | |
814d84f5 MG |
86 | # see "Authentication" section below for tokens and keys |
87 | t = Twitter( | |
88 | auth=OAuth(OAUTH_TOKEN, OAUTH_SECRET, | |
89 | CONSUMER_KEY, CONSUMER_SECRET) | |
90 | ) | |
51e0b8f1 | 91 | |
814d84f5 MG |
92 | # Get your "home" timeline |
93 | t.statuses.home_timeline() | |
51e0b8f1 | 94 | |
814d84f5 | 95 | # Get a particular friend's timeline |
aaf199d3 | 96 | t.statuses.user_timeline(screen_name="billybob") |
51e0b8f1 | 97 | |
ae2bf888 HN |
98 | # to pass in GET/POST parameters, such as `count` |
99 | t.statuses.home_timeline(count=5) | |
100 | ||
101 | # to pass in the GET/POST parameter `id` you need to use `_id` | |
102 | t.statuses.oembed(_id=1234567890) | |
103 | ||
814d84f5 MG |
104 | # Update your status |
105 | t.statuses.update( | |
106 | status="Using @sixohsix's sweet Python Twitter Tools.") | |
51e0b8f1 | 107 | |
814d84f5 MG |
108 | # Send a direct message |
109 | t.direct_messages.new( | |
110 | user="billybob", | |
111 | text="I think yer swell!") | |
d09c0dd3 | 112 | |
814d84f5 MG |
113 | # Get the members of tamtar's list "Things That Are Rad" |
114 | t._("tamtar")._("things-that-are-rad").members() | |
51e0b8f1 | 115 | |
814d84f5 MG |
116 | # Note how the magic `_` method can be used to insert data |
117 | # into the middle of a call. You can also use replacement: | |
118 | t.user.list.members(user="tamtar", list="things-that-are-rad") | |
a5aab114 | 119 | |
814d84f5 | 120 | # An *optional* `_timeout` parameter can also be used for API |
9ae71d46 | 121 | # calls which take much more time than normal or Twitter stops |
122 | # responding for some reason | |
814d84f5 | 123 | t.users.lookup(screen_name=','.join(A_LIST_OF_100_SCREEN_NAMES), _timeout=1) |
51e0b8f1 | 124 | |
ae2bf888 HN |
125 | # Overriding Method: GET/POST |
126 | # you should not need to use this method as this library properly | |
127 | # detects whether GET or POST should be used, Nevertheless | |
128 | # to force a particular method, use `_method` | |
129 | t.statuses.oembed(_id=1234567890, _method='GET') | |
5a412b39 R |
130 | |
131 | # Send a tweet with an image included (or set your banner or logo similarily) | |
132 | # - by just reading your image from the web or a file in a string: | |
133 | with open("example.png", "rb") as imagefile: | |
134 | params = {"media[]": imagefile.read(), "status": "PTT"} | |
135 | t.statuses.update_with_media(**params) | |
136 | # - or by sending a base64 encoded image: | |
137 | params = {"media[]": base64_image, "status": "PTT", "_base64": True} | |
138 | t.statuses.update_with_media(**params) | |
ae2bf888 | 139 | ``` |
51e0b8f1 | 140 | |
814d84f5 | 141 | Searching Twitter:: |
51e0b8f1 | 142 | |
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143 | ``` python |
144 | # Search for the latest tweets about #pycon | |
145 | t.search.tweets(q="#pycon") | |
146 | ``` | |
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147 | |
148 | Using the data returned | |
149 | ----------------------- | |
150 | ||
151 | Twitter API calls return decoded JSON. This is converted into | |
152 | a bunch of Python lists, dicts, ints, and strings. For example:: | |
153 | ||
814d84f5 MG |
154 | ```python |
155 | x = twitter.statuses.home_timeline() | |
51e0b8f1 | 156 | |
814d84f5 MG |
157 | # The first 'tweet' in the timeline |
158 | x[0] | |
51e0b8f1 | 159 | |
814d84f5 MG |
160 | # The screen name of the user who wrote the first 'tweet' |
161 | x[0]['user']['screen_name'] | |
162 | ``` | |
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163 | |
164 | Getting raw XML data | |
165 | -------------------- | |
166 | ||
167 | If you prefer to get your Twitter data in XML format, pass | |
168 | format="xml" to the Twitter object when you instantiate it:: | |
169 | ||
814d84f5 MG |
170 | ```python |
171 | twitter = Twitter(format="xml") | |
172 | ``` | |
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173 | |
174 | The output will not be parsed in any way. It will be a raw string | |
175 | of XML. | |
176 | ||
177 | ||
178 | The TwitterStream class | |
179 | ----------------------- | |
180 | ||
181 | The TwitterStream object is an interface to the Twitter Stream API | |
182 | (stream.twitter.com). This can be used pretty much the same as the | |
183 | Twitter class except the result of calling a method will be an | |
184 | iterator that yields objects decoded from the stream. For | |
185 | example:: | |
186 | ||
814d84f5 MG |
187 | ```python |
188 | twitter_stream = TwitterStream(auth=UserPassAuth('joe', 'joespassword')) | |
189 | iterator = twitter_stream.statuses.sample() | |
51e0b8f1 | 190 | |
814d84f5 MG |
191 | for tweet in iterator: |
192 | # ...do something with this tweet... | |
193 | ``` | |
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194 | |
195 | The iterator will yield tweets forever and ever (until the stream | |
196 | breaks at which point it raises a TwitterHTTPError.) | |
197 | ||
198 | The `block` parameter controls if the stream is blocking. Default | |
199 | is blocking (True). When set to False, the iterator will | |
200 | occasionally yield None when there is no available message. | |
201 | ||
84e6e1e4 | 202 | Per default the ``TwitterStream`` object uses |
203 | [public streams](https://dev.twitter.com/docs/streaming-apis/streams/public). | |
204 | If you want to use one of the other | |
205 | [streaming APIs](https://dev.twitter.com/docs/streaming-apis), specify the URL | |
206 | manually: | |
207 | ||
208 | - [Public streams](https://dev.twitter.com/docs/streaming-apis/streams/public): stream.twitter.com | |
209 | - [User streams](https://dev.twitter.com/docs/streaming-apis/streams/user): userstream.twitter.com | |
210 | - [Site streams](https://dev.twitter.com/docs/streaming-apis/streams/site): sitestream.twitter.com | |
211 | ||
212 | Note that you require the proper | |
213 | [permissions](https://dev.twitter.com/docs/application-permission-model) to | |
214 | access these streams. E.g. for direct messages your | |
215 | [application](https://dev.twitter.com/apps) needs the "Read, Write & Direct | |
216 | Messages" permission. | |
217 | ||
9ae71d46 | 218 | The following example demonstrates how to retrieve all new direct messages |
84e6e1e4 | 219 | from the user stream: |
220 | ||
221 | ```python | |
222 | auth = OAuth( | |
223 | consumer_key='[your consumer key]', | |
224 | consumer_secret='[your consumer secret]', | |
225 | token='[your token]', | |
226 | token_secret='[your token secret]' | |
227 | ) | |
228 | twitter_userstream = TwitterStream(auth=auth, domain='userstream.twitter.com') | |
229 | for msg in twitter_userstream.user(): | |
230 | if 'direct_message' in msg: | |
231 | print msg['direct_message']['text'] | |
232 | ``` | |
233 | ||
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234 | Twitter Response Objects |
235 | ------------------------ | |
236 | ||
9ae71d46 | 237 | Response from a Twitter request. Behaves like a list or a string |
51e0b8f1 MV |
238 | (depending on requested format) but it has a few other interesting |
239 | attributes. | |
240 | ||
241 | `headers` gives you access to the response headers as an | |
242 | httplib.HTTPHeaders instance. You can do | |
243 | `response.headers.getheader('h')` to retrieve a header. | |
244 | ||
245 | Authentication | |
246 | -------------- | |
247 | ||
248 | You can authenticate with Twitter in three ways: NoAuth, OAuth, or | |
249 | UserPassAuth. Get help() on these classes to learn how to use them. | |
250 | ||
251 | OAuth is probably the most useful. | |
252 | ||
253 | ||
254 | Working with OAuth | |
255 | ------------------ | |
256 | ||
257 | Visit the Twitter developer page and create a new application: | |
258 | ||
5d5d68cc | 259 | **[https://dev.twitter.com/apps/new](https://dev.twitter.com/apps/new)** |
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260 | |
261 | This will get you a CONSUMER_KEY and CONSUMER_SECRET. | |
262 | ||
263 | When users run your application they have to authenticate your app | |
9ae71d46 | 264 | with their Twitter account. A few HTTP calls to Twitter are required |
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265 | to do this. Please see the twitter.oauth_dance module to see how this |
266 | is done. If you are making a command-line app, you can use the | |
267 | oauth_dance() function directly. | |
268 | ||
bcbd4e2b | 269 | Performing the "oauth dance" gets you an oauth token and oauth secret |
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270 | that authenticate the user with Twitter. You should save these for |
271 | later so that the user doesn't have to do the oauth dance again. | |
272 | ||
273 | read_token_file and write_token_file are utility methods to read and | |
274 | write OAuth token and secret key values. The values are stored as | |
275 | strings in the file. Not terribly exciting. | |
276 | ||
277 | Finally, you can use the OAuth authenticator to connect to Twitter. In | |
278 | code it all goes like this:: | |
279 | ||
814d84f5 MG |
280 | ```python |
281 | from twitter import * | |
51e0b8f1 | 282 | |
814d84f5 MG |
283 | MY_TWITTER_CREDS = os.path.expanduser('~/.my_app_credentials') |
284 | if not os.path.exists(MY_TWITTER_CREDS): | |
285 | oauth_dance("My App Name", CONSUMER_KEY, CONSUMER_SECRET, | |
286 | MY_TWITTER_CREDS) | |
51e0b8f1 | 287 | |
814d84f5 | 288 | oauth_token, oauth_secret = read_token_file(MY_TWITTER_CREDS) |
51e0b8f1 | 289 | |
814d84f5 MG |
290 | twitter = Twitter(auth=OAuth( |
291 | oauth_token, oauth_secret, CONSUMER_KEY, CONSUMER_SECRET)) | |
51e0b8f1 | 292 | |
814d84f5 | 293 | # Now work with Twitter |
04e76c4d | 294 | twitter.statuses.update(status='Hello, world!') |
814d84f5 | 295 | ``` |
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296 | |
297 | ||
298 | License | |
299 | ======= | |
300 | ||
8be9a740 | 301 | Python Twitter Tools are released under an MIT License. |