Key contact

Gavin Wray
Digital Communications Executive
West Midlands Regional Observatory
T: 0121 202 3252
E: gavin.wray@wmro.org

Feedback on the API

Use our blog to share links to your applications and add ideas on how to improve the API

Keep up to date

Web service and API documentation

Screenshot representing website sources included in our search serviceThe search service on this website is powered by Exalead. As well as providing search results for content on this website, the service signposts visitors to content on other regional organisations' sites.

This search service can be accessed via an API.

We encourage you to use the API for your own website or web applications. Please do experiment and let us know what you think.

What's in it?

The first version of the search service, released in August 2009, includes results from:

 

From April 2010, the search service also includes results from:

 

The aim is to build a high quality search index of content relevant to policy makers and data users in the West Midlands.

How to access the web service API

The search functions are exposed as a Web Service.

Search requests for the service should be POSTed to the following URL:

http:/​/​search.wmro.org/​xibis

The WSDL for the web service is accessible at the following URL:

http:/​/​search.wmro.org/​xibis?wsdl=com.exalead.search.wsdl

There's an HTML search interface for testing purposes at:

http:/​/​search.wmro.org/​wmro

Documentation for developers

See the search front-​end API: XML v10 guide (pdf, 1.33mb) for details on accessing and using the web service API.

See the query language guide (pdf, 241kb) on building queries for the Exalead search engine, including combining the query fragments shown below with additional query terms.

Query Repository
corporate/​tree:"Top/​Source/​Advantage West Midlands" http:/​/​www.advantagewm.co.uk
corporate/​tree:"Top/​Source/​wmro.org" http:/​/​www.wmro.org
corporate/​tree:"Top/​Source/​Observations" http:/​/​wmro.wordpress.com
corporate/​tree:"Top/​Source/​Learning and Skills Council"

http:/​/​readingroom.lsc.gov.uk/​lsc/​WestMidlands

corporate/​tree:"Top/​Source/​Staffordshire Observatory"

http:/​/​www.staffordshirepartnership.org.uk/​observatory

corporate/​tree:"Top/​Source/​Staffordshire Research Unit"

http:/​/​www.staffordshire.gov.uk/​yourcouncil/​researchunit

corporate/​tree:"Top/​Source/​Warwickshire Observatory" http:/​/​www.warwickshireobservatory.org
corporate/​tree:"Top/​Source/​WMPHO" http:/​/​www.wmpho.org.uk/​publications/​

 

Feedback

Please do try out the web service in your own website or applications. It'd be great to learn how the service is being used, experimentally or otherwise — and how it can be improved.

You can add comments and share links on our Observations blog, contact gavin.wray@wmro.org or tweet @thewmro.

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