Making a Request to Yahoo API Using PHP - PHP

Now that you have an Application ID, you are ready to create your web application. It will do the following tasks:

• Send a request to Yahoo to get inbound links data (which will contain all of the request parameters to be discussed below, including your Application ID).
  
• Receive the response from the Yahoo Site Explorer API.
  
• Convert the response to a compatible data format that can be easily manipulated in PHP.
  
• Extract relevant data for analysis from the compatible data structure.
  
• Accept user inputs if necessary (this can be done via a web form).
  
• Perform inbound link analysis using the raw data provided by the Yahoo Inbound Link API.
  
• Output the results to the browser.

All of these six important tasks will be covered in this tutorial series. It will help you develop easy, useful and even advanced inbound link-related analysis using the Yahoo Site Explorer Link API.

To make a request to the Yahoo API is like sending a GET request. This type of request is done by appending parameters in the URL. These parameters are variables which can be changed depending on the intent of the application. Based on official Yahoo documentation on making a request, the official request URL is this:

http://search.yahooapis.com/SiteExplorerService/V1/inlinkData

The above URL is a standard and should NOT be altered. It is the official request URL for the Yahoo Inbound Links API. Now, since this is a form of GET request, to append your application ID (which will be needed for authentication), add a "?" string to the official request URL:

http://search.yahooapis.com/SiteExplorerService/V1/inlinkData?appid=
TuyopjhfC3V34Flh34343hgpmw467678B4BI8VUI7asczVWIjJDwbD3QRWcNmmeQ--

Your Application ID is just one of the request parameter/variables you can append. The official list of parameters can be found at the  link under "Request Parameters."

Based on the request parameters, "appID" (application ID) and "query" are required; all others are optional, except when your application needs them.

Example: If you would like the Yahoo Inbound Link API to send you the data for the domain http://www.php-developer.org , and you need five results as well as having the output be compatible with PHP, the following is the final request URL (with parameters and value):

http://search.yahooapis.com/SiteExplorerService/V1/inlinkData?appid=
TuyopjhfC3V34Flh34343hgpmw467678B4BI8VUI7asczVWIjJDwbD3QRWcNmmeQ--&query=http://www.php-developer.org&results=5&output=php