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Call Google Tiny URL API in MATLAB

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Kevin
Kevin on 10 Jun 2016
Edited: Kevin on 21 Jan 2018
Hi everyone,
I am trying to call Google URL Shortener API https://developers.google.com/url-shortener/v1/getting_started#actions in MATLAB to shorten an URL. I know that I can go to https://goo.gl/ and manually paste the long URL into the text box. But I am wondering if I can do that programatically in MATLAB.
I know very little about web programming and this is as far as I can get,
options = weboptions('RequestMethod','post');
data = webread('https://www.googleapis.com/urlshortener/v1/url', 'longUrl', 'http://www.google.com/', options)
Error using readContentFromWebService (line 45)
The server returned the status 400 with message "Bad Request" in response to the request to URL https://www.googleapis.com/urlshortener/v1/url.
Error in webread (line 122)
[varargout{1:nargout}] = readContentFromWebService(connection, options);

Answers (1)

Chi
Chi on 19 Jan 2018
First, you should have a URL shortener API key. It can be generated in the Google Credentials page .
Then, the matlab code:
url='https://www.googleapis.com/urlshortener/v1/url?key={yours}';
options = weboptions('RequestMethod','post', 'MediaType','application/json');
Body = struct('longUrl', 'http://www.google.com/');
response = webwrite(url, Body, options);
  1 Comment
Kevin
Kevin on 19 Jan 2018
Edited: Kevin on 21 Jan 2018
Hi Chi,
Thank you very much for your suggestion. I followed your instruction to click the link "Google Credentials page" to create the key. I got the key and tried out the following MATLAB code. But I got error message from Google.
key = 'this_is_not_the_real_key';
url = ['https://www.googleapis.com/urlshortener/v1/url?key=', key];
options = weboptions('RequestMethod', 'post', 'MediaType', 'application/json');
Body = struct('longUrl', 'http://www.google.com/');
response = webwrite(url, Body, options);
Error using readContentFromWebService (line 46)
The server returned the status 403 with message "Forbidden" in response
to the request to URL https://www.googleapis.com/urlshortener/v1/url?
key=this_is_not_the_real_key.
Seems to me that the key (that I copy-and-paste from Google) does not work. I already set the key to "unrestricted" in Google page.
Kevin

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