Simple API question: How/Where do I get the API key?

Bill Bennett

I've set up an API admin group and given it the needed permissions, per the instructions I somehow managed to get hold of. But while they refer to the CONVIO_API_KEY requirement, they don't tell me how to get it. Seems simple enough, but I've yet to find an answer. Can someone help?

Also, can I just say how massively frustrating it has been trying to find basic information like this? I have found any number of abstract overview descriptions of the API and what you can do with it, plus several detailed discussions among people who are already using it, but VERY few step-by-step instructions on *getting* started and what I have found--such as the one above--don't contain all the information I need or any links to get it. I don't see why this has to be so difficult!

Corey Pudhorodsky

Sorry you've had trouble finding API information. Definitely don't hesitate to post messages in the community or contact support or your Account Manager when you're having problems!

By the details in what you've shared already, I gather you've already found the documentation a

http://customer.convio.com/site/PageServer?pagename=Help_Admin_ConvioAPIs_SiteConfig

That goes over the basic setup required to use the APIs.

The CONVIO_API_KEY is a site parameter that is entered in the Convio Admin site. Go to Setup...Site Options. Where it says: "Select Property Type To View:" choose: "Convio API" and click Go. Then you will see the CONVIO_API_KEY. This key can be anything you'd like. It will be passed via the API to improve the security of proving the the call is being made from a site with permissions to call data from your site.

Hope this helps. Please don't hesitate to reply if you're having other problems or we can get you more info!

Corey

Bill Bennett

Corey Pudhorodsky:

Sorry you've had trouble finding API information. Definitely don't hesitate to post messages in the community or contact support or your Account Manager when you're having problems!

By the details in what you've shared already, I gather you've already found the documentation a

http://customer.convio.com/site/PageServer?pagename=Help_Admin_ConvioAPIs_SiteConfig

That goes over the basic setup required to use the APIs.

The CONVIO_API_KEY is a site parameter that is entered in the Convio Admin site. Go to Setup...Site Options. Where it says: "Select Property Type To View:" choose: "Convio API" and click Go. Then you will see the CONVIO_API_KEY. This key can be anything you'd like. It will be passed via the API to improve the security of proving the the call is being made from a site with permissions to call data from your site.

Hope this helps. Please don't hesitate to reply if you're having other problems or we can get you more info!

Corey

Thanks Corey--exactly the information I was hunting for! Let's change that smiley to a

We're developing a complex interactive application part of which is a simple registration form that we'd like to have capture data into Convio--just a name, email address and a specific interest group category that we can later use to contact people who have used the application. I'm familiar with the theory of API's but I haven't actually tried to use one before, so I'm hoping this is a farily straightforward exercise to get my feet wet in this stuff. One complication would be that some of the users may already be in our Constituent db, so I need to be able to alter a profile to add this interest group in the same operation. Looks like the createOrUpdate method will do that...?

Anyway, I seem to recall finding an example of the kind of thing here in the Community, so I'm poking around for that. If you know of a good posting or tutorial along these lines I'd love to know about it.

Thanks again.

Corey Pudhorodsky

Bill Bennett:

Thanks Corey--exactly the information I was hunting for! Let's change that smiley to a

We're developing a complex interactive application part of which is a simple registration form that we'd like to have capture data into Convio--just a name, email address and a specific interest group category that we can later use to contact people who have used the application. I'm familiar with the theory of API's but I haven't actually tried to use one before, so I'm hoping this is a farily straightforward exercise to get my feet wet in this stuff. One complication would be that some of the users may already be in our Constituent db, so I need to be able to alter a profile to add this interest group in the same operation. Looks like the createOrUpdate method will do that...?

Anyway, I seem to recall finding an example of the kind of thing here in the Community, so I'm poking around for that. If you know of a good posting or tutorial along these lines I'd love to know about it.

Thanks again.

You might find the following example and documentation helpful:

http://open.convio.com/api/constituent-api/client/code/two-step-registration.html

Note that this example assumes that the form is hosted on a Convio page so the Authentication token can be passed. This is the trickiest part as the user needs to be logged in or the authentication token granted via the SSO API in order to complete updates of existing constituent records.

Good luck and keep us posted of your progress!

conviojames

You make a great point, and while I can't resolve it all today, I am working to improve the documentation and the ease of finding information within the Open Community. All feedback is welcome.

Bill Bennett

Bill Bennett:

Thanks Corey--exactly the information I was hunting for! Let's change that smiley to a

We're developing a complex interactive application part of which is a simple registration form that we'd like to have capture data into Convio--just a name, email address and a specific interest group category that we can later use to contact people who have used the application. I'm familiar with the theory of API's but I haven't actually tried to use one before, so I'm hoping this is a farily straightforward exercise to get my feet wet in this stuff. One complication would be that some of the users may already be in our Constituent db, so I need to be able to alter a profile to add this interest group in the same operation. Looks like the createOrUpdate method will do that...?

Anyway, I seem to recall finding an example of the kind of thing here in the Community, so I'm poking around for that. If you know of a good posting or tutorial along these lines I'd love to know about it.

Thanks again.

For the two-step example it looks like I'll need to set up a new page wrapper with the requisite javascript in the <head> tag? Because the PageBuilder itself doesn't give access to head elements, unless I'm missing something. Is that more or less SOP?

Ultimately I've got to figure out how to do this as a createOrUpdate from a non-Convio page, I'm pretty sure. It's going to live inside a Flash application on its own domain/website, and we don't want to drop visitors out of that user experience to do a log-in. Unless there's some way to make it appear seamless, which I don't see yet. And since some of the visitors may already have Convio accounts it can't be just a "create" function unless I'm missing something there too.

I did find this discussion thread, which looked promising: Creating a signup for an interest group on an outside webpage. That's exactly what we're trying to do, but I haven't managed to get the script snippet to work in our environment yet. I posted a comment there describing what I tried and the result so far.

Thanks for any help--feeling a little dense at this point.