In the previous section, you learned how to take advantage of the features offered by the Yahoo! Web Search Service, by coding only a simple PHP 5 script. Besides, once the pertinent service was queried with a sample search term, the corresponding results were returned to the browser in XML format, to be displayed on the browser.

So, considering that you understood the basics of using this web service, I'm going to teach you how to code a similar script. It will be focused on utilizing another popular web service provided by Yahoo!, namely the one that searches video files.

That being said, here’s the definition of this brand new script: 

try{

// example using Yahoo! Video Search Web Service - search results are displayed in raw XML format

$request='http://search.yahooapis.com/VideoSearchService/V1/
videoSearch?appid=Your-AP-ID&query=madonna&results=4';

// trigger the http request

if(!$results=file_get_contents($request)){

throw new Exception('Error requesting Yahoo! Web service');

}

// display the results in XML format

header('Content-type:text/xml;charset=iso-8859-1');

echo $results;

}

catch(Exception $e){

echo $e->getMessage();

exit();

}

Definitely that wasn’t rocket science, right? As you can see, in this case I modified only the URL of the web service being requested, at the beginning of the script, in order to retrieve four different video files associated with the search term “Madonna.”

Besides, since the script simply fetches these results in raw XML format, this is the output generated by it, after performing the pertinent search process:

<ResultSet xsi:schemaLocation="urn:yahoo:srchmv
http://api.search.yahoo.com/VideoSearchService/V1/
VideoSearchResponse.xsd" totalResultsAvailable="10365"
totalResultsReturned="4" firstResultPosition="1">

<Result>

<Title>madonna_2004_montage.wmv</Title>

<Summary>, interviews, news footage and tour clips from New York and Paris....here's hoping 2005 is just as busy! Right Click And Save Target As Madonna's 2004 Movie Montage (WMV) - 7:44 - 21.8Mb Noticias madonna - Noticias madonna - Noticias madonna </Summary>

<Url>http://madonnalicious.com/downloads/
madonna_2004_montage.wmv</Url>

<ClickUrl>http://madonnalicious.com/downloads/
madonna_2004_montage.wmv</ClickUrl>

<RefererUrl>http://www.descargaarchivos.com/noticias/index.php?
query=madonna&type=video</RefererUrl>

<FileSize>22902293</FileSize>

<FileFormat>msmedia</FileFormat>

<Height>240</Height>

<Width>320</Width>

<Duration>464</Duration>

<Streaming>false</Streaming>

<Channels>2</Channels>

<Thumbnail>

<Url>http://scd.mm-so.yimg.com/image/1702970034</Url>

<Height>105</Height>

<Width>140</Width>

</Thumbnail>

</Result>

<Result>

<Title>madonna_earlscourt_190804.wmv</Title>

 <Summary>http://www.madonnalicious.com/downloads/
madonna_gelredome_090904.wmv madonna 9sep
2004http://www.madonnalicious.com/downloads/
madonna_earlscourt_190804.wmv
http://www.madonnalicious.com/downloads/
madonna_arlscourt_dtm_190804.wmv</Summary>

<Url>http://www.madonnalicious.com/downloads/
madonna_earlscourt_190804.wmv</Url>

<ClickUrl>http://www.madonnalicious.com/downloads/
madonna_earlscourt_190804.wmv</ClickUrl>

<RefererUrl>http://lounge.cosmopolitan.nl/messages/1/14515.html?
1095249265</RefererUrl>

 <FileSize>42149471</FileSize>

<FileFormat>msmedia</FileFormat>

<Height>240</Height>

<Width>320</Width>

<Duration>543</Duration>

<Streaming>false</Streaming>

<Channels>2</Channels>

<Thumbnail>

<Url>http://scd.mm-so.yimg.com/image/1700163527</Url>

<Height>105</Height>

<Width>140</Width>

</Thumbnail>

</Result>

<Result>

<Title>madonna.al.et.mpg</Title>

<Summary>Summary: Watch Madonna on Entertainment Tonight : Madonna discusses American Life with ET .mpg Noticias madonna - Noticias madonna - Noticias madonna -</Summary>

<Url>http://steveswartz.com/madonna.al/madonna.al.et.mpg</Url>

<ClickUrl>http://steveswartz.com/madonna.al/
madonna.al.et.mpg</ClickUrl>

<RefererUrl>http://www.descargaarchivos.com/noticias/index.php?
query=madonna&type=video</RefererUrl>

<FileSize>12821508</FileSize>

<FileFormat>mpeg</FileFormat>

<Height>240</Height>

<Width>352</Width>

<Duration>73</Duration>

<Streaming>false</Streaming>

<Channels>2</Channels>

<Thumbnail>

<Url>http://scd.mm-so.yimg.com/image/1794815224</Url>

<Height>98</Height>

<Width>145</Width>

</Thumbnail>

</Result>

<Result>

<Title>madonna_jonathanross_ruperteverett.wmv</Title>

<Summary>And Save Target As Friday Night With Jonathan Ross - Rupert Everett On Madonna (WMV) - 1:25 - 2.45Mb Noticias madonna Noticias madonna - Noticias madonna</Summary>

<Url>http://www.madonnalicious.com/downloads/
madonna_jonathanross_ruperteverett.wmv</Url>

<ClickUrl>http://www.madonnalicious.com/downloads/
madonna_jonathanross_ruperteverett.wmv</ClickUrl>

<RefererUrl>http://www.descargaarchivos.com/noticias/index.php?
query=madonna&type=video</RefererUrl>

<FileSize>2579729</FileSize>

<FileFormat>msmedia</FileFormat>

<Height>240</Height>

<Width>320</Width>

<Duration>85</Duration>

<Streaming>false</Streaming>

<Channels>2</Channels>

<Thumbnail>

<Url>http://scd.mm-so.yimg.com/image/1703473304</Url>

<Height>105</Height>

<Width>140</Width>

</Thumbnail>

</Result>

</ResultSet>

<!--

ws05.search.scd.yahoo.com uncompressed/chunked Wed Oct 17
07:41:48 PDT 2007

-->

As shown above, the previous search returned the URL of four video files along with some additional information about them, such as their format and size, and the respective dimensions of the corresponding thumbnails as well.

Again, it’s clear to see here that those search results can be easily formatted in (X)HTML, only using a few lines of PHP code, but as I expressed earlier, I will leave you this task as homework (if you’re having trouble sleeping, you may want to try this).

All right, as you learned in the previous example, using the Yahoo! Video Search Service with PHP 5 is indeed a straightforward process that can be performed with minor hassles. Therefore it’s time to move on and code a final hands-on example. The example in question will be focused on querying the Yahoo! Image Search Service directly from a PHP 5 script.

As you might have guessed, this procedure will be discussed in the upcoming section, so click on the below link and keep reading.