HomePHP Page 8 - Using The Google Web APIs With PHP
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The Google Web APIs allow developers to build SOAP-basedapplications driven off Google's unique indexing and searchcapabilities. And since there are now quite a few PHP classes designedfor SOAP transactions over HTTP, integrating the two has never beensimpler. This article explains how.
It's also possible to write equivalent code using the PEAR SOAP client, rather than the NuSOAP client. The procedure remains largely identical, though there is obviously a difference in the API used. As an illustration, consider the following code segment, which rewrites how the primitive search engine demonstrated a few pages back using the PEAR class:
<html>
<head><basefont face="Arial"></head>
<body>
<?php
if (!$_POST['q'])
{
?>
<h2>Search</h2>
<form action="<?=$_SERVER['PHP_SELF']?>" method="post">
Search term: <input type="text" name="q">
</form>
<?
}
else
{
// include the class
include("SOAP/Client.php");
// create a instance of the SOAP client object
$soapclient = new
SOAP_Client('http://api.google.com/search/beta2');
// set up an array containing input parameters to be
// passed to the remote procedure
$params = array(
'key' => 'your-google-license-key-xxxxxxxx', // Google
license key
'q' => $_POST['q'], // search
term
'start' => 0, // start
from result n
'maxResults' => 10, // show a
total of n
results
'filter' => true, // remove
similar results
'restrict' => '', // restrict
by topic
'safeSearch' => true, // remove
adult links
'lr' => '', // restrict
by language
'ie' => '', // input
encoding
'oe' => '' // output
encoding
);
// invoke the method on the server
$result = $soapclient->call("doGoogleSearch", $params,
"urn:GoogleSearch");
// print the results of the search
if (PEAR::isError($result))
{
?>
<h2>Error</h2>
<? echo $result['faultstring'];?>
<?
}
else
{
?>
<h2>Search Results</h2>
<? echo $result['estimatedTotalResultsCount'] . " hits
found in " . $result['searchTime'] . " ms"; ?>
<ul>
<?
if (is_array($result['resultElements']))
{
foreach ($result['resultElements'] as $r)
{
echo "<li><a href=" . $r['URL'] . ">" .
$r['title'] . "</a>";
echo "<br>";
echo $r['snippet'] . "(" . $r['cachedSize'] .
")";
echo "<p>";
}
}
?>
</ul>
<?
}
}
?>
</body>
</html>
This is very similar to what you've just seen - not
surprising, considering that the PEAR SOAP client is based largely on code taken from Dietrich Ayala's NuSOAP classes. And, in case you want even more convenience, take a look at the SOAP_Google class, also part of the PEAR CVS repository, which provides a set of wrapper functions designed specifically for PHP developers looking to use the Google Web APIs.
Here's a quick example of what a script using the SOAP_Google class might look like:
<html>
<head><basefont face="Arial"></head>
<body>
<?php
if (!$_POST['q'])
{
?>
<h2>Search</h2>
<form action="<?=$_SERVER['PHP_SELF']?>" method="post">
Search term: <input type="text" name="q">
</form>
<?
}
else
{
// include the class
include("SOAP_Google.php");
// create a instance of the SOAP_Google client object
// pass the license key to the constructor
$google = new SOAP_Google('your-google-license-key-xxxxxxxx');
// invoke the search() method
$result = $google->search(array('query' => $_POST['q']));
// print the results of the search
if ($result)
{
?>
<h2>Search Results</h2>
<? echo $result['estimatedTotalResultsCount'] . " hits
found in " . $result['searchTime'] . " ms"; ?>
<ul>
<?
if (is_array($result['resultElements']))
{
foreach ($result['resultElements'] as $r)
{
echo "<li><a href=" . $r['URL'] . ">" .
$r['title'] . "</a>";
echo "<br>";
echo $r['snippet'] . "(" . $r['cachedSize'] .
")";
echo "<p>";
}
}
?>
</ul>
<?
}
else
{
echo "<h2>Error</h2>";
}
}
?>
</body>
</html>
Parsing Google Maps API using PHP and JSON
