The Farking JavaScript for your website

The Onion created this awesome fartscroll.js.

It's best to take a look at a demo from HuffingtonPost, making celebrities fart.

You will be glad to read the farking source code on github.

It's a killer API.

OnTime API

With the enticing prizes (new iMac! iPad! Nexus 7!), I decided to give the contest a try.

I read up OnTime API Doc, which wasn't too bad, except that they DON'T have:

• Curl examples
• SDK (none!)
• Examples (except C#..)
• Sample request for URL and body

I only need 2 API - first for authentication, then post a feature. 

These curl commands could help you get started quicker:

1. Get your access token

curl -X GET --data-urlencode grant_type=password  \

--data-urlencode username=yourusername \
--data-urlencode password=yourpassword \
--data-urlencode client_id=yourid \
--data-urlencode client_secret=yoursecret \
--data-urlencode "scope=read write" \
https://yourcompany.ontimenow.com/api/oauth2/token

From the JSON response, get the access token which is needed for all other APIs.

2. Post a feature (aka story)

curl -X POST \

--header "Content-Type:application/json" \
-d "{\"item\":{\"name\":\"New stuff\",\"project\":{\"id\":1}}}" \
https://hoiio.ontimenow.com/api/v1/features?access_token=youraccesstoken

Note: This assumes you have already created a project (the first is id 1).

With that, tada!~

SwitchCoder - Telephony Platform without API

SwitchCoder is kind of like Twilio, but without the RESTful APIs.

Instead, they provide a javascript engine for you to write your code.

This javascript way of using telephony service is not new. Tropo has implemented that for a long time.

Their pricing is fairly similar to Twilio, Tropo, Plivio (and a dozen):

• 1 cent per minute
• 1 cent per SMS
• $0.50 per phone number

Phewtick API

Phewtick is an iPhone/Android app that let users earn cash as they meet up with friends.

Yes, you didn't hear wrong. It EARNS you CASH$!

There is Phewtick-hack on Github that shows the API being used by the app. Using their very own API, you could automate the "meet-ups" and earn cash automatically. If only they could cash out in the end.

Apply a Job via API (Parse)

If you have not heard, Parse.com is an API provider that helps you build mobile apps (with server-client architecture), without touching the server side!

That is all good news for one-man-shop mobile developer.

If you are interested in working for this fast growing startup, you can apply via API.

There are too many good things I found after reading their documentation - CRUD any object to Parse server, manage user sign up and login and forget password, push messaging, etc..

Anyway, awesome doc with clear, comprehensive, and nice fonts.

The Pirate API

Every Sep 19, it is Talk Like A Pirate Day. Bet you didn't know.

There's an ARRRPI to help you translate text. Like this

http://isithackday.com/arrpi.php?text=hello my friend, do you know where I can meet a woman around here?

The best flights API - FlightStats

FlightStatus API provides information on airport and flights (even live). They recently released their new (improved) Flex API.

A lookup at ProgrammableWeb even mentioned Siri as one of it's mashup.

It is free to evaluate for 30 days. Then you could decide if you want a commercial plan. For example, it is $0.004 to check a flight status.

Paymill, the new Payment API

Stripe is the hottest REST API for Payment.

It has now being cloned by the infamous Rocket Internet.

Paymill is the new API, and the differentiating factor now is that it supports Germany. Even it's documentation is in German.

Copify - An API for Copywriting

You might have outsourced your copywriting to Freelancer.com, odesk.com, or even to fiverr.com (for a mere $5)!

Copify is going into a very specific vertical of outsourcing. Or you can call them a niche.

With their network of approved writers, you can easily post your project offer and find someone to do the job.

And Copify takes it to another level with their Copify API! You can POST/GET/PUT/DELETE jobs!

Yahoo! Search API - BOSS

Google, the king of search, used to provide a cool web search API. But that has been deprecated.

An alternative to Google Search API is Yahoo! Check out BOSS. You read it correctly, boss.

It is a paid API at $0.80 per 1,000 queries. Kind of expensive.

SMRT API - bus arrival timing

SMRT (Singapore bus company) does have some APIs, including that of real time bus arrival time.

For example:
http://54.251.58.124/api/get_bus_timing?bus_service_number=857&bus_stop_number=60089

I first found out about the API from UP Singapore, a hackathon event. But it might be there just for the 2 weeks event.

The REST API for Credit Card Payment

You might thought Paypal API would be mentioned.

But no, it's Stripe, the new kid on the block.

It is so simple to charge to a credit card with it's 1 line of http request:

curl https://api.stripe.com/v1/charges \
   -u vtUQeOtUnYr7PGCLQ96Ul4zqpDUO4sOE: \
   -d amount=400 \
   -d currency=usd \
   -d "description=Charge for site@stripe.com" \
   -d "card[number]=4242424242424242" \
   -d "card[exp_month]=12" \
   -d "card[exp_year]=2012" \
   -d "card[cvc]=123"

Charges: 2.9% + 30 cents

Google Drive API

Need I say more?

It's already here, together with the service.

Photo Infrastructure - Chute API

If you have ever dealt with photos (or media files) for your website or mobile apps, you know how difficult it is to store, resize, crop, etc..

Chute API is a infrastructure as a service, specifically for photos! Check out the documentation here. They are currently in beta, and is free to use, though they will charge for additional features in the future.

Parse - Add a backend with learning server side coding

One of the peeves for mobile developer is that if they are building a server-client app, not only do they need to learn the framework from the client side (such as iOS, Android, WP7), they ALSO need to learn how to code the server side.

On the server side development, it involves a couple of things. You need to setup the server, use a certain web framework, setup database, and create the APIs.

Parse is a development tools that help to get rid of these cumbersome server side development. It provides iOS and Android SDK that helps to connect to Parse backend and store your objects!

It is free if you have less than 200,000 API requests a month. Anymore, you would be paying $9 to $99.

Zappos has an API, and organizes a winter Hackathon

Zappos Winter Hackathon is Coming

Zappos API can be used to search products. The API returns complete products details including the different styles, images, reviews and statistics. There is even an AutoComplete API for you to implement search auto-complete (like how Google search did)!

Pretty fun API for an online store.

Wait, What Does Your Startup Do?

It is always easy to explain what your startup do in terms of "X for Y", where is X is a well known business. For example:

This idea generation service is provided by itsthisforthat.

They even cheekily created an API for that.

Phoneify API: Verify Phone Number With SMS or Call

Phonesify provides a plugin for website to verify a user's phone number. This can done either via sending an SMS with a verification code, or making a voice call and reading out the code.

Verifying phone number, especially on mobile apps, is getting more popular. WhatsApp, Viber, Blogger, Facebook.. to name a few. Verifying phone number is also more popular because email verification is not very strong to be used as an identity anymore. However, a trade off is that phone number verification is more costly.

The price of using Phoneify doesn't come cheap. Right now, they have not provide their pricing model, but they claimed to give 50 free verifications, which upon sign up will show a $20 credits. Hence, I estimate it to be 40 cents per verification. If it is 40 cents, it is a very costly verification, considering that SMS is as cheap as 1 cent.

FullContact API: Know more about a contact

FullContact is 1 simple API that query with a person email, and returns with more information – name, phone number, organizations, social network profiles, etc..

If your application requires retrieving more info from an email, there is a chance this API will help.

They claim to have over 1 million contacts in their database. Impressive, but still not quite a lot, considering there are 6 billion people in the world. 

It cost 3 cents per contact.

Google Acquired Dealmap, with API for Local Coupons

With the recent acquisition of The Dealmap, Google now adds to its arsenal another great API.

The Dealmap API let developers add and search local deals.

Google might not have a successful Groupon product, but acquiring such an API now could help path it's way to that market.