International Journal of Electronics and

Communication Engineering (IJECE)

ISSN 2278-9901
Vol. 2, Issue 3, July 2013, 117-132
© IASET

APIs TO EXTRACT INFORMATION FROM AN EXISTING WEB RADIO APPLICATION

ANSELM MATHIAS, SAJID M. SHEIKH, ANNAH M. JEFFREY & SHEDDEN MASUPE

Department of Electrical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, University of Botswana, Gaborone, Botswana

ABSTRACT

Web radio is a broadcast of an audio stream over the internet. In this day of computerization, just digitizing a task
is no longer enough as automation is the key principle currently required to effectively use any resource available. Most
radio applications do not provide integration facilities for micro services such as SMS or Voice. This paper presents APIs
that were developed to extract information from an existing web radio application, in order to allow any developer of micro
services to have the possibility to easily use the Web Radio. The web radio management known as Airtime was chosen to
provide such integration capabilities with the use of RESTful APIs. Airtime is an Open Source Application which allows
the control of the Web Radio. By reverse engineering the PostgreSQL database that supports the Airtime application,
suitable functions were designed and then developed to meet the objectives of extracting information. The API functions
created were show/search, show/details, track/search, track/details, stats/server, stats/icecast, playlist/search and
playlist/details. The APIs perform searching for specific shows based on information provided, search for media that is
available on the media server (mostly interviews, and podcasts) and provide statistical information such as application
status from the servers. With the assistance of the Restler (Luracast) framework, Object Oriented PHP code and SQL,
scripts were successfully written and tested to provide the required functionalities.

KEYWORDS: Airtime, API, Open Source, PHP, Radio, Restler, SQL, Web Radio
List of Abbreviations
AMF : Action Message Format

API : Application Programming Interface

ASCII : American Standard Code for Information Interchange

CSV : Comma Separated Values

HTML : Hypertext Transfer Protocol

HTTP : Hyper Text Transfer Protocol

JSON : Javascript Object Notation

MP3 : MPEG-1 or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III

MSMQ : Microsoft Message Queuing

REST : Representational State Transfer

SaaS : Software as a Service

SMS : Short Messaging Service

SMTP : Simple Mail Transfer Protocol

SOAP : Simple Object Access Protocol

118 Anselm Mathias, Sajid M. Sheikh, Annah M. Jeffrey & Shedden Masupe

SQL : Sequential Query Language

TCP : Transmission Control Protocol

URI : Universal Resource Indicator

URL : Universal Resource Locator

W3C : World Wide Web Consortium

XML : eXtensible Markup Language

INTRODUCTION

Web Radio brings traditional radio to the digital era through access of Radio over the Internet. As technology
evolves the need to do tasks manually has reduced considerably. This is achieved by promoting automation, either by use
of scripts that run once a specific event has occurred, or developing multiple open ended Application Programming
Interfaces (APIs), that do a variety of tasks which are integrated into a large range of products. Alternatively, by sharing
code (open source-architecture), developers are given an opportunity to add more functionalities to an existing product
instead to spending time accomplishing a task that is already done by someone else.

An API is a set of programming instructions and standards for accessing a Web-based software application or
Web tool. A software company releases its API to the public so that other software developers can design products that are
powered by its service. For example, Google uses APIs for showing weather reports, website visit statistics and many
others. APIs follow the Software as a Service (SaaS) methodology, so that software developers do not have to start from
scratch every time they write a program. For software developers with a C or C++ background, an API is similar to a
function call [1].

An API is a software-to-software interface and not a user interface. The API itself is abstract, in that it specifies an
interface and does not get involved with the implementation details. The software that provides the functionality described
by an API is said to be an implementation of the API. With APIs, applications can interconnect, hence when operating and
running, they are invisible to the users. These could be additional functions that are like frameworks to be used by future
programmers to build onto, or to create added functionality [2,3]. The main objective of this research project was to
develop APIs allowing any developer of micro service to have the possibility to use and control an existing webradio
system. The micro service generates content and the APIs that will be created will be used ontop of the existing webradio
management system. Theweb APIs should be useable from a php project to interact with a web radio system.

After considerable amount of research, an open source application called “Airtime” was selected to provide radio
streaming/broadcasting services. However, the Airtime application did not have any intergration or automation facilities
that could be used by Third party and micro service providers. The project also aimed at developing codes/APIs for
achieving this functionality. Different API Architectures were scrutinised to find a suitable design that could be used in the
development of the APIs for the Airtime software. Implementation of the Architecture, the design of the APIs and testing
of the APIs were tasks that were acomplished for this project.

This project provided a product that can be used by and distributed with the application. The developed APIs
would have the following functionalities;

 Search specific shows based on information provided.

APIs to Extract Information from an Existing Web Radio Application 119

 Be able to search media that is available on the media server (mostly interviews, and podcasts).

 Provide statistical information such as application status from the servers.

API FRAMEWORK

A framework is a universal reusable software platform to develop software or APIs. These include support
programs, compilers, codes, libraries, APIs and tool sets. This section briefly presents the main web application framework
that were studied, learned and used to code the APIs needed to provide the required functionalities.

HTTP Methods

The HyperText Transfer Protocol (HTTP) was designed and developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force
and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) in 1999. This was to enable communication between clients and servers.
HTTP was designed to use verbs (methods) to achieve a specific task or manipulate a specific resource. Some of these
verbs are GET, POST, PUTand DELETE[4].

The actions performed by these verbs are based on their name, where GET requests a resource from the server and
POST submits information to the server. The line below is an example of GET that assigns "variable 1" the value of
"value1", and "variable 2" the value of "value2".

/test/form.asp?variable1=value1&variable2=value2

The same thing can be achieved using POST as shown in the snippet code below

POST /test/form.asp HTTP/1.1

Host: localhost.com

variable1=value1&variable2=value2

There are many formats in which the system can give an output such as XML, JSON, plain text and CSV. Thus, it
becomes very crucial to understand and select an appropriate output format. It should be noted that plain text and CSV are
not used in web-oriented architectures.

XML

Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a specific form of writing text, which is defined by the World Wide Web
Consortium(W3C). It was designed to be easily implemented and used with HTML; it was also designed to be both human
and machine-readable. XML has been used as the core language in communication of different protocols. XML uses tags -
however, these tags are not predefined. The tag is defined by either a person or the automated machine. A sample of how
XML looks is shown in Figure 1 [5].

Figure 1: Sample of XML Output [5]

120 Anselm Mathias, Sajid M. Sheikh, Annah M. Jeffrey & Shedden Masupe

JSON

JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) is a text format that is designed to be human readable and is used for
interchange of data. JSON is derived from and supported within Javascript, whereas XML requires libraries to retrieve
additional data. JSON is also language independent and was designed to be minimal, portable, and textual. Figure 2
represents a sample output in the JSON format.

Figure 2: Sample of JSON Output [6]

Through implementation and case studies, it is realized that JSON is considerably faster as it uses less resources,
is easier to read and interpret by a human andis simpler to use than XML. It is crucial to understand that the APIs sole
purpose is to manipulate data, where JSON fits more naturally as it is data-oriented in design [7]. JSON format was
therefore used to display the output in this project [6].

SOAP-Based Web Service

Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) is a lightweight protocol intended for exchanging structured information
in a decentralized, distributed environment. It makes use of XML technologies [4], by mostly relying on the application
layer, and can be used over any transport protocol such as TCP, HTTP, SMTP, or even MSMQ. Developed by a group of
vendors such as Microsoft, IBM, and Lotus, SOAP became a W3C Recommendation on 24th June 2003 [8, 9].

At the core, SOAP defines a way to move XML messages between two systems [10]. The SOAP message consists
of a header element made up of header information, a body element that contains call and response information, and a fault
element containing errors and status information. The actual SOAP message is shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Simple SOAP Messaging [8]

In SOAP, XML is used to provide an output that is acquired from any scripts. SOAP provides flexibility such that
other protocols can be stacked over the HTTP, which is used as the transportation protocol [11]. The above advantage can
also pose as a security risk, as the SOAP standard also does not have any in-built security facilities. SOAP also has other
problems, in terms that the service is only one-way (from client to server), and that it is slower than other technologies.
[12]

RESTful Web Service

Representational State Transfer (REST) is a style of software architecture for distributed hyper media systems
such as the World Wide Web. REST provides a set of architectural constraints that, when applied as a whole, emphasizes
APIs to Extract Information from an Existing Web Radio Application 121

scalability of component interactions. A general construct is shown in Figure 4. Roy Thomas Fielding coined the term
“Representational State Transfer”, in his Doctorate dissertation entitled “Architectural Styles and the Design of Network-
based Software Architectures”[13].

Figure 4: REST Relationship Diagram [13]

An alternative way to distinguish and define REST would be to say that it is a stateless server, where each request
from a client contains all the information necessary to service the request, which clearly separates the clients and servers.
REST clients can cache responses if allowed and there is a direct interface between clients and server. The client can then
request code from the server and execute it on demand. REST has a loosely typed architecture, but uses nouns and verbs to
promote flexibility and usability. REST is not restricted to parsing out only XML, it also uses less bandwidth and provides
error checking[14,15].

In order for REST APIs to work, it should be able to identify the resource, e.g. by using the Universal Resource
Indicator (URI), and also be able to manipulate the resource through representation (i.e. modify or delete), using the HTTP
request of GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE. REST‟s own flexibility can be a problem since there is no common accepted
standard for REST, hence interoperability between large systems might be a problem. [16, 17,18]. By using the above
architectures, it clearly demonstrates how the system would get the data, and how it would respond. Having understood the
advantages and disadvantages of each type of entity, the REST architecture was selected for this project, as it would
perfectly fit the scalability needs of the application.

Restler Framework

There are many Frameworks that are designed for various reasons and in different languages, such as Tonic,
Restler, Slim, FRAPI, Zend Framework just to name a few[19]. From these many options, the Restler framework was
selected as this web-API framework provides easy deployment of the REST architecture. Restler is prebuilt using different
applications to provide an inbuilt solution thus avoiding the re-writing of the code. It is very simple to use if object-
oriented programming of PHP is already understood. Restler also supports different formats like JSON, XML, yaml, amf,
plist.

Emerginov Platform

This is an open-source solution developed by Orange Labs, which provides the opportunity to build application
with the use of service such as SMS and Voice. One such platform is located locally in Botswana, for the encouragement
of local industries to use it, create solution, and nurture ideas in fields such as m-health and agriculture. This platform was
used to demonstrate the capabilities of the API [20, 21].

GUIDELINES

In designing API's there are no fixed rules, however, there are the recommended practices that have been
122 Anselm Mathias, Sajid M. Sheikh, Annah M. Jeffrey & Shedden Masupe

perfected over the years of development by professionals. The guidelines below have been used in the code design and
implementation [22]

 Structure: Normally APIs follow the standard design procedure shown in the Figure 5.

Figure 5: Anatomy of API [22]

 Versioning: It is very important to provide versioning as it and helps in large scale development without
hindering older users. For example, Facebook versions such as "?v=1.0"

 Status Codes: Use of HTTP status codes to relevant standard-based codes for errors, e.g. Google uses 200, 201,
304, 400, 401, 403, 404, 409, 410, 500. Information that is provided by the server should be as descriptive as
possible in order to relay any problems that have occurred which needs to be rectified.

For example:

“status”: 409

“property”: “name”,

“message”: “A directory named „ Avengers‟ already exists”,

“developerMessage”:”a directory named „Avenger‟ already exists. If you have a stale local cache, please
expire it now.”

“moreInfo”:www.check it out.com/errors/31337

For the code designed, the inbuilt Restler error codes were used.

 Authentications – Sessions are to be avoided whenever possible and provide authentication for every request if
necessary. Existing protocol such as Oauth 1.0a, Oauth2 or SSL are to be used. In this project, the authentication
is done by the Emerginov platform.

METHODOLOGY
Implementation Architecture
Due to the complexity of building an open-source application and the constant changes associated with it, the
APIs were to be built by manipulating the PostgreSQL Database on which the application was built upon. Other factors
that also affected this decision were the speed of computation and reducing points of failure. The envisioned
implementation is such that the APIs are to be built within the Airtime application, and should be available only to the
APIs to Extract Information from an Existing Web Radio Application 123

developers that are authenticated by the Emerginov platform. The listeners, being unaware of such complexities, would
only be able to access the broadcast that is given out from Icecast. This is demonstrated in the Figure 6.

Figure 6: Design of Proposed Implementation

Proposed API Functionalities

The APIs that needed to be developed to extract data are meant to provide as much information from the Airtime
Application‟s features that already exist. Below are functions that have to be carried out by the APIs to be developed:

 Search Shows: This will allow developers to acquire information pertaining to show line-ups. This contains
information such as; which shows are when, who is the host etc. By doing a search, a developer can get additional
information using the "details"option.

 Search Tracks: This option would help search for tracks based on the criteria provided, and even provide more
present if requested.

 List Radio Statistics and Media Information: This would allow the developers to access the meta data of tracks
held in the database, and the statistics of the server, that can be used for maintenance gathered by the application.

Detailed Description of the Services and Existing Database Model

Since the manipulation of the application is done through the database, it is important to understand the tables and
the information each field holds. However, a small extract is shown below and complete relational database is shown in
figure 7.

 Shows: Currently when a show is updated, its details are stored in the table labelled "cc_show" shown in Figure 8.
This mostly contains name of the show and few other details dealing with aesthetics of how the show will look in
the calendar. It also has options for authenticating users who would join into the live stream, either using the
authentication already existing in the Airtime user database or using a predetermined username and password.

Figure 8: Table cc_show

124 Anselm Mathias, Sajid M. Sheikh, Annah M. Jeffrey & Shedden Masupe

The information about when the show is to be started is stored in another table called"cc_show_days” (Figure 9).
This table furthershows the starting date and time, and the duration of the show and the date of when the show ends,
assuming that the shows are repeated. In addition, "day" represents the day of the week, which starts Sunday of as "0".

Figure 9: Table cc_show_days

Relationship Diagram: In order to manipulate the data on the server side, it is necessary to understand the
relationship between the tables themselves. This means that when data is changed in one table, the related table should also
be changed using the SQL "JOIN" functions, so as to not the break the database. In Figure7 the lines show how specific
fields are connected to other fields in the tables.

Proposed Error Codes

The error codes are important as they are a means to provide insight into the inner workings of a code without
going through the code itself, in case a problem arises from the use of the code. The most standardised error messages were
written for the HTTP, from which these error codes were derived [3].

Table 1 below describes all the errors codes and the description associated with them, which were used in the
development of the APIs. These are few of the error codes that are built into the Restler framework, that are going to be
used in the APIs.

Table 1: Proposed Use of Errors

Error
Error Text Description
Code
This is when the request has been
200 Ok
successfully carried out.
201 Created Resource has been successfully modified.
The request cannot be fulfilled due to bad
400 Bad Request
syntax.
The requested resource could not be
found but may be available again in the
404 Not Found
future. Subsequent requests by the client
are permissible.
Internal This is when either a connection or query
500
Server Error has failed to get the required information.

RESULTS

This section presents the data manipulation, using the specified HTTP method call used for each service and the
API coding. Each service is broken down into a brief description of what the service is supposed to do, followed by the
parameters that are required to process the request. The parameters which are closely associated with the table field names
are manipulated and then stored in the database. These parameters can be either optional or required. The HTTP method
GET is mostly used to acquire data, and POST is used when inserting data as well as dealing with anything other than
APIs to Extract Information from an Existing Web Radio Application 125

American Standard Code for Information Interchange (ASCII) e.g. media files such as mp3's .The output results contain
the information that will be obtained by the use of the specific API. This information is summarized and placed in Table 2
presented at the end of this paper.

Show Data API

An example is provided here for the "show/details" API. In order to use this API the show ID must be provided.
When this API is called, the name of the show, the genre, the description of the show, when the show starts, and when it
ends is displayed. If it is repeating, it will show all the entries as well as the expected outputs.

API Coding

In order to produce the required results, object-oriented programming of PHP had to be used by the use of classes.
The sample extracts of "index.php" are shown below. This page is accessed through following
"http://localhost/apiv1/index.php" on the local machine after deployment of Airtime. The "index.php" is the main page that
any site starts. As soon as the web server calls on the "index.php" file, the Restler framework shown by the snippet below
was loaded.

require_once '../vendor/restler.php';

useLuracast\Restler\Restler;

A new instance of the object Restler is created, and then parses the data that is required for the class function to be
acted upon as shown below. This is how Restler is controlled and works. The default format is XML, so Restler has to be
manually set to JSON format

$r = newRestler();

$r->setSupportedFormats('JsonFormat');

$r->addAPIClass('playlist');

The API then goes to acquire the credential stored in the "/etc/airtime/airtime.conf" file, which is required in
connection to the PostgreSQL database and is stored in an array called “airtime_config” as shown below.

$airtime_config = parse_ini_file("/etc/airtime/airtime.conf") ;

The snippet below shows when a connection called “dbconn” is established with the credentials acquired.

$dbconn= pg_connect("host=$airtime_config[host]
dbname=$airtime_config[dbname] user=$airtime_config[dbuser]
password=$airtime_config[dbpass]");

Error checking is done on every stage; the code snippet below is a condition that gets called incase the connection
to the database fails. This is very crucial as any tasks and functions that are to follow will not work, hence the web server is
forced to “exit” before parsing any other lines.

if (!$dbconn) { // error if the connection fails

echo "An error occured connecting to Database. \n";

exit;

}
126 Anselm Mathias, Sajid M. Sheikh, Annah M. Jeffrey & Shedden Masupe

The APIs are be characterized by the notion of data entering (insertion) the system, or data leaving (extraction) the
system.

APIs Created for Extracting Data

There is a class called "playlist" and a function called "search" in it that has four variable called "playlist_name",
"playlist_description", "limit", and "page". The latter two variables are pre-set, while the former two are empty as shown in
the snippet below.

class playlist {

function search ($playlist_name ='*', $playlist_description = '*', $limit='25',$page='1') {

The "limit" and "page" number variables are used in breaking up the results into pages, this process is called
pagination. This is done to prevent the over flow of search results, that either leads to unpleasant use of the application or
the bottlenecking of the system resources. An example of how pagination is used is shown below, the variables are then
used in the SQL statement.

if ($page >0){

$page = $page-1;

$page = $limit *$page;

Most variables that are provided are firstly converted to the upper cases, shown in the code below. This is to ease
the process of searching, as well as avoiding errors.

$playlist_name = strtoupper($playlist_name);

$playlist_description = strtoupper($playlist_description);

Once the values have been assigned to the specific function, the function then calls in the global connection
variable to see if the connection to the database is successful. The defined values are then used as part of an SQL search
from the database, whose results are stored in a variable labelled "result". The SQL query is designed to use wildcards in
the beginning and the end of a string variable. The process below shows an example of such a process.

$result = pg_query($dbconn, "SELECT id, name, description FROM cc_playlist where ('$playlist_name' = '*' or
upper(name) like '%$playlist_name%') and ('$playlist_description' = '*' or upper (description) like
'%$playlist_description%') order by id asc limit $limit offset $page" )

The variable result is one big array, and hence to break it down, a loop had to be designed to split the information
line by line. This is then broken down into “rows” and stored in a new array, which is assigned to “tempObject”. The
“tempObject” is assigned to “resultant” and this process of assignment is repeated till there are no more results. This is
shown by the snippet below.

$number_of_rows =pg_num_rows($result) ;

if ($number_of_rows> 0) {

while ($row = pg_fetch_array($result)){

$tempObject = newStdclass () ;
APIs to Extract Information from an Existing Web Radio Application 127

$tempObject->Id = $row[0];

$tempObject->Name= $row[1];

$tempObject->Description= $row[2];

$resultant [ ] = $tempObject;

return $resultant ;

“resultant” is then returned from the function back to the main page, by doing so it escapes the function and clears
up the “result” variable. Restler then pushes the output to the client using the syntax shown below.

$r->handle();

After this, all the information is removed from memory and the connections are closed. This is done for security
reasons and to free up system resources.

pg_free_result($result);

pg_close($dbconn);

This process is repeated for every class and every function in the same way when called upon. The above function
uses the GET request, to accomplish the task of acquiring information from the system.

Testing

Testing is an important phase in the development of any product. Below are different tests carried out to find the
durability of the developed code and possibly rectify where it has its shortfalls. The input value for playlist details is the
playlist ID (which is an integer). So, if a string is placed as shown in Figure 10, an exception is thrown as shown in Figure
11, which shows an error "400". By referencing it to the design, it means that a bad syntax has been used.

Figure 10: Variable Testing

Figure 11: Error, Bad Syntax

It is rare to find an internal error, but it has to be catered for. Table 3summarizes the values of the results that were
obtained under testing of the APIs created.
128 Anselm Mathias, Sajid M. Sheikh, Annah M. Jeffrey & Shedden Masupe

Table 2: Summarized Outcome of Testing

Class/ Input Expected Response

Tested Variable /Type Input Value
Function Type Response Acquired
showname /string String new Pass pass
Genre/ String String Rap Pass pass
DJ_name /String String Stig Pass pass
time_heard /Date Date 10-01-2013 Pass pass
Show/
time_heard /Date String 10th Nov Fail fail
search
Limit / integer Integer 20 Pass pass
Limit / integer String twenty Fail fail
Page /integer Integer 10 Pass pass
Page /integer String Ten Fail fail
Showid /integer Integer 10 Pass pass
Show/ Showid /integer String Ten Fail fail
details Limit / integer Integer 20 Pass pass
Limit / integer Integer twenty Fail fail
trackname /String String Me Pass Pass
genre/String String Rap Pass pass
artist_name /String String Stick Pass Pass
Track/ album_title/String String Dance Pass pass
search limit/integer Integer 10 Pass pass
limit/integer Integer Ten Fail fail
page/integer Integer 20 Pass pass
page/integer Integer twenty Fail fail
Track/ Trackid/integer Integer 20 Pass pass
details Trackid/integer String twenty Fail fail
playlist_name /String String mix Pass pass
playlist_description /String String All the house Pass pass
Playlist/ Limit / integer Integer 20 Pass pass
search Limit / integer String twenty Fail fail
Page /integer Integer 10 Pass pass
Page /integer String Ten Fail fail
Playlist/ Playlist_id /integer Integer 5 Pass pass
details Playlist_id /integer String New Fail Fail
Stats/
NULL NULL Pass pass
icecast
Stats/
NULL NULL Pass pass
server

DISCUSSIONS

Creating a solution for a live (already in production) open source application is a very daunting task as it always
remains a "cat and mouse game" between the independent developer (who are adding new functionalities to the product),
the core developers (those who develop the application) and the bug testers. Hence, it is very important to build any third
party application quickly and pass it on to the core developers who would then integrate it into the next update. In order to
do this, a team of developers are required especially to achieve this task. The development of the APIs had started on
Airtime version 2.2, and most functions were built for this. However, version 2.3 was then released on which some
function failed to work completely, and as such the API development had to restart in relation to a few functions that were
updated in the new version.

Other problems encountered were the lack of documentation associated with the technical design of the
application. As it is open source, most developers add functionality without providing the technical documentation of the
design procedure as it is not a key requirement. A lot of time was spent to reverse-engineer the application to find out what
their functions are, where and how they are used, the security, and the validations associated with it. This was realised
APIs to Extract Information from an Existing Web Radio Application 129

when working with the Airtime application, as the database documentation was non-existent. Working with Open Source
applications such as the one used in this project without documentation on coding can make API development a challenge.

CONCLUSIONS

The APIs developed are completely open source. The APIs provide a range of functions that are available on the
application, but are not available to the developers. The developed APIs will provide external developers with the
opportunity in accessing the application without having to physically login, but having valid platform credentials.

The many APIs coded have various functions, where an API called "show/search" was developed to search any
show in the database, based on the show name, the genre, the time the show was heard, and even the DJ name. More
details could further be acquired by using the "show/details" API. Another API called "track/search" would search through
the database by comparing it to the information provided. This information could then be used to download the file. The
"stats/icecast" and "stats/serverAPIs that were built would list the server statistics for remote monitoring of the server, from
servers such as Icecast when called upon.

The HTTP method GET request was mostly used when requesting information from the server and the POST
request is called to manipulate information in the radio application such as uploading of files and editing of data.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The Authors will like to thank Morgan Richomme and Arnaud Morin from Orange Labs for their guidance on the
API coding and the use of the Emerginov Platform. The Authors will also like to thank the community namely from
“Stackoverflow” and “sourcefabric” in assisting when issues with the code were encountered.

REFERENCES

1. Software & Information Industry Association. (2001, February). Software as a Service: Strategic Backgrounder.
Retrieved Feburary 28, 2013, from Software & Information Industry Association:

http://www.siia.net/estore/pubs/SSB-01.pdf

2. How to Leverage an API for Conferencing. (n.d.). Retrieved April 26, 2013, from How stuff works:
http://money.howstuffworks.com/business-communications/how-to-leverage-an-api-for-conferencing3.htm

3. Rouse, M. (2005, September). SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol). Retrieved April 26, 2013, from
Techtarget: http://searchsoa.techtarget.com/definition/SOAP

4. R. F. (1999). Hypertext Transfer Protocol -- HTTP/1.1. Retrieved April 12, 2013, from world Wide web
consortium: http://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616.html

5. Extensible Markup Language (XML) 1.0 (Fifth Edition). (2008, November 26). Retrieved April 4, 2013, from
world wide web consortium: http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-xml/

6. Nurzhan Nurseitov, M. P. Comparison of JSON and XML Data Interchange Formats: A Case Study.

7. drrwebber. (2013, April 26). Analysis of JSON use cases compared to XML. Retrieved May 12, 2013, from
Oracle blogs: https://blogs.oracle.com/xmlorb/entry/analysis_of_json_use_cases

8. W3C Recommendations (2007, April 27). SOAP Version 1.2 Part 1: Messaging Framework (Second Edition).
Retrieved January 23, 2013, from World Wide Web Consortium: http://www.w3.org/TR/soap12-part1/#intro
130 Anselm Mathias, Sajid M. Sheikh, Annah M. Jeffrey & Shedden Masupe

9. Kyrnin, J. (n.d.). web design /HTML . Retrieved December 29, 2012, from About.com:

http://webdesign.about.com/od/soap/a/what-is-xml-soap.htm

10. SOAP Introduction. (n.d.). Retrieved march 12, 2013, from w3schools.com:

http://www.w3schools.com/soap/soap_intro.asp

11. Skonnard, A. (2003, march). Understanding SOAP. Retrieved January 18, 2013, from MSDN:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms995800.aspx

12. The Advantages and Disadvantages of Using SOAP Messages. (n.d.). Retrieved Feburary 23, 2013, from xyzws:
http://www.xyzws.com/scdjws/studyguide/soap_chapter8.html

13. Fielding, R. T. (2000). Architectural Styles and the Design of Network-based Software Architectures. Retrieved
October 21, 2012, from http://www.ics.uci.edu/~fielding/pubs/dissertation/rest_arch_style.htm

14. Olson, M. (2002, jully 03). The Python Web services developer: Messaging technologies compared. Retrieved
march 15, 2013, from IBM Developer Works: http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/library/ws-pyth9/

15. Elkstein, D. M. (n.d.). Rest Server Responses. Retrieved January 12, 2012, from Learn REST: A Tutorial:
http://rest.elkstein.org/2008/02/rest-server-responses.html

16. Oracle. (n.d.). Web Services: REST vs. SOAP. Retrieved Feburary 18, 2013, from Milan's blog by Oracle:
https://blogs.oracle.com/milan/entry/web_services_rest_vs_soap

17. SOAP vs. REST. (2010, January 15). Retrieved March 12, 2013, from spf13: http://spf13.com/post/soap-vs-rest

18. Huppo. (2011, june). Compare and contrast REST and SOAP web services. Retrieved march 14, 2013, from
stackoverflow: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/10975863/compare-and-contrast-rest-and-soap-web-services

19. Lane, K. (2011, Septmeber 23). Short List of RESTful API Frameworks for PHP. Retrieved March 14, 2013, from
Programmableweb: http://blog.programmableweb.com/2011/09/23/short-list-of-restful-api-frameworks-for-php/

20. Orange. (2012, December 04). Emerginov, An innovative solution for mobile services development in Africa.
Retrieved February 19, 2013, from Orange news: http://www.orange.com/en/news/2012/novembre/Emerginov-
an-innovative-solution-for-mobile-services-development-in-Africa

21. Orange. (n.d.). About. Retrieved February 19, 2013, from Emerginov: http://www.emerginov.org/about.php

22. Jansen, G. (2011). The Job of the API Designer. Retrieved January 19, 2013, from Restful API design:
https://restful-api-design. readthedocs.org/en/latest/scope.html.
APIs to Extract Information from an Existing Web Radio Application 131

APPENDICES

Figure 7: Relationships of Table in the Database

Table 3: Inputs, Methods and Outputs Associated to an API Function

Paramet
HTTP Output Results
API Name Description Parameters -ers
Method Contents
Type
name - list the name of
the show
This can list all the genre - list the genre
Show_id, show_name,
show in the of the show
Show_genre,
Show/search database, or can be time_heard - to refine
Optional GET show_description,
refined by any field search parameter using
show_starts, show_ends,
as criteria YYYY-MM-DD
DJ_name.
HH:MM
DJ_name - name of
the host
Show _ name,
show_genre ,
this should list all
show_id - list the name show_description ,
Show/details details available
of the show Required GET show_start_time (yyyy-
about a specific
mm-ddhh:mm:ss),
show
show_duration,
Host_name
track_title - list the
tracks associated with
This can list all the that name
tracks in the artist_name- list the
database, the can tracks associated with
Track_ id , track_name,,
Track/search be refined by any an artist
Optional GET artist_name, album_title,
field as a criteria, album_title- list the
Genre
This is a more tracks associated with
generalized search, the specified album
that uses wildcards. name
Genre - list tracks
with a specific genre
132 Anselm Mathias, Sajid M. Sheikh, Annah M. Jeffrey & Shedden Masupe

Table 3: Contd.,
this will give out
Id , track_title,
all the information
artist_name, album_title,
available (the
Genre, disc_number,
Track/details metadata) on the Track_id Required GET
mood, label,
file that is
track_number, copyright,
associated to the
length
track id.
Current_listeners,
Peak_listeners,
current_song,
content_type,
Airtime_Version,
Playout_Engine_Running
_Seconds,
Playout_Engine_Mem_Pe
rc,
Playout_Engine_Cpu_Per
This is where all
c,
the statistics are
Liquidsoap_Running_Sec
available for
Stats/server NONE Required GET onds,
analysis, from
Liquidsoap_Mem_Perc,
media-monitor
Liquidsoap_Cpu_Perc,
Media_Monitor_Running
_Seconds,
Media_Monitor_Mem_Pe
rc ,
Media_Monitor_Cpu_Per
c,
Rabbitmq_Running_Seco
nds,
Rabbitmq_Mem_Perc,
Rabbitmq_Cpu_Perc
This is where all
Title, description,
the statistics are
content_type,
available for
Stats/icecast NONE Required GET mount_start, bitrates
analysis, from
Listeners, most_listeners,
icecast
genre, url
This method assists
the developer to
search and list Playlist_name,
Playlist/search Playlist_name
playlists ( could be Optional GET playlist_descriptio,
playlist_description
used with playlist_id
keywords or wild
cards ie *)
This method gives
more details about
the contents in a
playlist, this will be
Playlist_name,
done by exploting
Playlist_duration,
Playlist/details the Playlist_ID Required GET
files_in_playlist,
table_cc_playlist
playlist_id
and
table_cc_playlistco
ntents,
table_cc_file