Digg developer upgrade includes better search, story-finding tools
Social news aggregator Digg just expanded its set of application programming interfaces — the services that allow third-party developers to build software using information from the site. Changes in the APIs include better search and article discovery. Digg has been working to make more of its data available to third parties, as part of its plan to be the largest news aggregator on the web.
From the company blog post:
One of the most requested features has been for a search endpoint and we’re excited to make it available in this release. This feature utilizes the same search functionality introduced a couple months back with the overhaul of Digg search and provides a powerful solution for finding specific content on Digg. You’ll be able to use the advanced shortcuts, common search tricks, as well as search by source (domain). See the Search API documentation for more details.
We’ve also added a series of related stories endpoints, so that you can find related information for any story on Digg. One variation finds stories similar diggers have dugg. Another returns stories with similar keywords. Finally, we’ve included an endpoint for favorites on Digg, which are an indication of the stories that people find exceptional in some manner.
These features are just the beginning of some changes that we’re currently working on and plan to introduce in the coming months. These will include endpoints for participating — such as Digging and burying — so that even richer and full featured applications can be created off the Digg platform.
[Digg collage via Pronet Advertising.]
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About the Author, Eric Eldon
Eric currently covers digital media technology and business news, especially what's happening on social networks and their platforms. He also writes and edits stories about venture capital, and lots of other stuff, too. He started at VentureBeat in the spring of 2007, half a year or so after Matt Marshall left his reporting job at the San Jose Mercury News to found the site. Eric previously cofounded a startup called Writewith, that was building editorial software for newspapers and other groups of writers. The startup didn't work out, but he learned a lot.