docs.search
This method searches for the specified query in the public documents on Scribd.com. Private documents are not searchable.
Parameters
| Name | Type | Description |
|---|
| query | string | (required)
What to search for. More information on search queries.
|
| scope | ["all"] | (optional)
DEPRECATED. In the past, this parameter allowed you to search within a single user's documents, e.g., within the documents uploaded by your API account. Today docs.search only searches public documents site-wide on Scribd.com.
|
| category_id | integer | (optional)
Restricts search results to only documents in a certain category.
|
| language | string | (optional)
Restricts search results to only documents in the specified language (in ISO 639-1 format).
|
| simple | boolean | (optional)
This option specifies whether or not to allow advanced search queries (more information). When set to false, the API search behaves the same as the search on Scribd.com. When set to true, the API search allows advanced queries that contain filters such as title:"A Tale of Two Cities". Set to "true" by default.
|
| num_start | integer | (optional)
Together with num_results, allows you to paginate through the results returned. Defaults to 0. num_start+num_results must be less than 1000.
|
| num_results | integer | (optional)
The number of results to return. Defaults to 10. Capped at 1000.
|
| api_key | string | (required)
API key assigned to your account.
|
| api_sig | string | (optional)
MD5 hash of the active request and your secret key. This is an optional security measure. See the signing documentation for more info.
|
| session_key | string | (optional)
A session key for a signed in user. If this parameter is provided, your application will carry out actions on behalf of the signed in user corresponding to the session key. Otherwise, your application will carry out actions on behalf of the user account associated with the API account. See the authentication documentation for more information
|
| my_user_id | string | (optional)
This parameter is intended for sites with their own user authentication system. You can create phantom Scribd accounts that correspond to your users by simply passing the unique identifier you use to identify your own user accounts to my_user_id. If you pass this parameter to an API method, the API will act as if it were executed by the phantom user corresponding to my_user_id. See the authentication documentation for more information.
|
Sample return XML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<rsp stat="ok">
<result_set totalResultsAvailable="922" totalResultsReturned="2" firstResultPosition="1" list="true">
<result>
<title><![CDATA[Ruby on Java]]></title>
<description><![CDATA[Ruby On Java, Barcamp, Washington DC]]></description>
<access_key>key-t3q5qujoj525yun8gf7</access_key>
<doc_id>244565</doc_id>
<page_count>10</page_count>
<download_formats></download_formats>
<when_uploaded>2012-12-14T15:51:58+00:00</when_uploaded>
<when_updated>2013-11-14T15:51:58+00:00</when_updated>
</result>
<result>
<title><![CDATA[Ruby on Java Part II]]></title>
<description><![CDATA[Ruby On Java Part II, Barcamp, Washington DC]]></description>
<access_key>key-2b3udhalycthsm91d1ps</access_key>
<doc_id>244567</doc_id>
<page_count>12</page_count>
<download_formats>pdf,txt</download_formats>
</result>
</result_set>
</rsp>
Result explanation
| Name | Type | Description |
|---|
| result_set | list |
This contains the list of results returned by the search query. This has the following attributes. totalResultsAvailable: The number of query matches in the database. totalResultsReturned: The number of query matches returned. This may be lower than the number of results requested if there were fewer total results available. firstResultPosition: The position of the first result in the overall search.
|
| result | list |
Contains each individual result
|
| doc_id | integer |
Every document on Scribd has a unique document ID. You can use this ID to link to the document, among other things.
|
| secret_password | string |
The secret password allows access to the Scribd pages for private documents. This parameter will only be provided if scope is set to "user" and the given document is actually private
|
| access_key | string |
The access_key allows you to embed a document on an external site.
|
| title | string |
|
| description | string |
The document description.
|
| tags | string |
Comma separated list of tags for the document
|
| license | ["by", "by-nc", "by-nc-nd", "by-nc-sa", "by-nd", "by-sa", "c", "pd"] |
See Wikipedia:Creative_Commons_License. "c" is traditional copyright. "pd" is public domain.
|
| thumbnail_url | URL |
Link to a JPG that contains a thumbnail of the document. This can be used to make search results more presentable. Do not cache thumbnail URLs - they are subject to change.
|
| page_count | integer |
The number of pages in the document
|
| download_formats | list |
List of downloadable extensions.
|
| price | float (9.99) |
The price at which the document is sold. Only available on store documents.
|
| reads | integer |
Number of reads.
|
| uploaded_by | string |
The username of the user who uploaded this document.
|
| uploader_id | string |
The user id of the user who uploaded this document.
|
| when_uploaded | datetime |
The date the document was originally uploaded
|
| when_updated | datetime |
The date this document was last updated
|
Error codes
| 401 | Unauthorized |
| 500 | Internal Server Error. Scribd has been notified about this problem. |
| 601 | Required parameter missing |
| 610 | Search is temporarily down |
| 650 | Invalid parameter value |
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