PHP + Picasa

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

I upload my photos via Picasa to Picasa Web Albums (powered by Google). I am looking to pull off my photos and display them on my site.

I'd like to do this using PHP. I've looked through the API provided and have to admit I think they are too complicated for my task - they all want me to login, etc - assuming I am going to be uploading and so on - I simply want to be able to query an API to get, for example:

List of albums

Photos in an album

Can anyone please give me some pointers or provide some example code?

Many thanks

[zeroday]

List of Albums: http://code.google.com/apis/picasaweb/deve...html#ListAlbums

List of photos in album: http://code.google.com/apis/picasaweb/deve...ListAlbumPhotos

They are GET requests so they should be fairly simple.

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Bingo - cheers mate :)

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

OK, I have gotten so far but am stuck - and it's probably down to my understanding of XML.

Anyhow, I am trying to consume this feed: http://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/api/user/njlouch

My code is as such:

<?php
$xmlPath = "http://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857";
if (!$myxml=simplexml_load_file($xmlPath)){
	echo 'Error reading the XML file';
} else{
	foreach($myxml->entry as $track){
		echo('<b><a href="'.$track->id.'">'.$track->title.'</a></b>');
		echo('<b>'.$track->summary.'</b>');
		echo('<img src="'.$track->content->href.'">');


	}
}
?>

All I want to do at this stage is to access the image name, description and the image itself. The first two are simple, but it's the image I am stuck at. But ultimately I want to show for each entry:

- published

- title

- summary

- media:thumbnail

- media:content

This is the content of the feed:

<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?>
<feed xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom' xmlns:openSearch='http://a9.com/-/spec/opensearchrss/1.0/' xmlns:exif='http://schemas.google.com/photos/exif/2007' xmlns:geo='http://www.w3.org/2003/01/geo/wgs84_pos#' xmlns:gml='http://www.opengis.net/gml' xmlns:georss='http://www.georss.org/georss' xmlns:photo='http://www.pheed.com/pheed/' xmlns:media='http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/' xmlns:batch='http://schemas.google.com/gdata/batch' xmlns:gphoto='http://schemas.google.com/photos/2007'>
	<id>http://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857</id>
	<updated>2008-09-07T18:40:14.000Z</updated>
	<category scheme='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#kind' term='http://schemas.google.com/photos/2007#album'/>
	<title type='text'>20080907</title>
	<subtitle type='text'></subtitle>
	<rights type='text'>public</rights>
	<icon>http://lh6.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgCf3NxrE/AAAAAAAAAEQ/KtOgOMDMgho/s160-c/20080907.jpg</icon>
	<link rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#feed' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857'/>
	<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/njlouch/20080907'/>
	<link rel='http://schemas.google.com/photos/2007#slideshow' type='application/x-shockwave-flash' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/s/c/bin/slideshow.swf?host=picasaweb.google.com&RGB=0x000000&feed=http%3A%2F%2Fpicasaweb.google.com%2Fdata%2Ffeed%2Fapi%2Fuser%2Fnjlouch%2Falbumid%2F5243351093451015857%3Falt%3Drss'/>
	<link rel='http://schemas.google.com/photos/2007#report' type='text/html' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/reportAbuse?uname=njlouch&aid=5243351093451015857'/>
	<link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857?start-index=1&max-results=1000'/>
	<author>
		<name>Niki</name>
		<uri>http://picasaweb.google.com/njlouch</uri>
	</author>
	<generator version='1.00' uri='http://picasaweb.google.com/'>Picasaweb</generator>
	<openSearch:totalResults>2</openSearch:totalResults>
	<openSearch:startIndex>1</openSearch:startIndex>
	<openSearch:itemsPerPage>1000</openSearch:itemsPerPage>
	<gphoto:id>5243351093451015857</gphoto:id>
	<gphoto:name>20080907</gphoto:name>
	<gphoto:location></gphoto:location>
	<gphoto:access>public</gphoto:access>
	<gphoto:timestamp>1220747072000</gphoto:timestamp>
	<gphoto:numphotos>2</gphoto:numphotos>
	<gphoto:user>njlouch</gphoto:user>
	<gphoto:nickname>Niki</gphoto:nickname>
	<gphoto:commentingEnabled>true</gphoto:commentingEnabled>
	<gphoto:commentCount>0</gphoto:commentCount>
	<gphoto:allowPrints>true</gphoto:allowPrints>
	<gphoto:allowDownloads>true</gphoto:allowDownloads>
	<entry>
		<id>http://picasaweb.google.com/data/entry/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857/photoid/5243351093575526146</id>
		<published>2008-09-07T18:40:10.000Z</published>
		<updated>2008-09-07T18:40:10.000Z</updated>
		<category scheme='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#kind' term='http://schemas.google.com/photos/2007#photo'/>
		<title type='text'>012431.jpg</title>
		<summary type='text'></summary>
		<content type='image/jpeg' src='http://lh4.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgCgU5pwI/AAAAAAAAAEE/lB3WuZX9bQ4/012431.jpg'/>
		<link rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#feed' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857/photoid/5243351093575526146'/>
		<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/7I4RFVbODHoFcaenV8xFXQ'/>
		<link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/data/entry/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857/photoid/5243351093575526146'/>
		<link rel='http://schemas.google.com/photos/2007#report' type='text/html' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/reportAbuse?uname=njlouch&aid=5243351093451015857&iid=5243351093575526146'/>
		<gphoto:id>5243351093575526146</gphoto:id>
		<gphoto:version>1220812810331000</gphoto:version>
		<gphoto:position>1.04209837E9</gphoto:position>
		<gphoto:albumid>5243351093451015857</gphoto:albumid>
		<gphoto:width>640</gphoto:width>
		<gphoto:height>480</gphoto:height>
		<gphoto:size>41233</gphoto:size>
		<gphoto:client>picasa</gphoto:client>
		<gphoto:checksum>760c1fda</gphoto:checksum>
		<gphoto:timestamp>1220747072000</gphoto:timestamp>
		<exif:tags>
			<exif:imageUniqueID>1e8b8741694f39bc7380e1222fbd3fe1</exif:imageUniqueID>
		</exif:tags>
		<gphoto:commentingEnabled>true</gphoto:commentingEnabled>
		<gphoto:commentCount>0</gphoto:commentCount>
		<media:group>
			<media:title type='plain'>012431.jpg</media:title>
			<media:description type='plain'></media:description>
			<media:keywords></media:keywords>
			<media:content url='http://lh4.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgCgU5pwI/AAAAAAAAAEE/lB3WuZX9bQ4/012431.jpg' height='480' width='640' type='image/jpeg' medium='image'/>
			<media:thumbnail url='http://lh4.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgCgU5pwI/AAAAAAAAAEE/lB3WuZX9bQ4/s72/012431.jpg' height='54' width='72'/>
			<media:thumbnail url='http://lh4.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgCgU5pwI/AAAAAAAAAEE/lB3WuZX9bQ4/s144/012431.jpg' height='108' width='144'/>
			<media:thumbnail url='http://lh4.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgCgU5pwI/AAAAAAAAAEE/lB3WuZX9bQ4/s288/012431.jpg' height='216' width='288'/>
			<media:credit>Niki</media:credit>
		</media:group>
	</entry>
	<entry>
		<id>http://picasaweb.google.com/data/entry/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857/photoid/5243351114783303842</id>
		<published>2008-09-07T18:40:14.000Z</published>
		<updated>2008-09-07T18:40:14.000Z</updated>
		<category scheme='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#kind' term='http://schemas.google.com/photos/2007#photo'/>
		<title type='text'>012448.jpg</title>
		<summary type='text'></summary>
		<content type='image/jpeg' src='http://lh5.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgDvVOqKI/AAAAAAAAAEM/-Egc7UiyN9Q/012448.jpg'/>
		<link rel='http://schemas.google.com/g/2005#feed' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/data/feed/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857/photoid/5243351114783303842'/>
		<link rel='alternate' type='text/html' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/VhQPN7Sc63O7porpugkfnQ'/>
		<link rel='self' type='application/atom+xml' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/data/entry/api/user/njlouch/albumid/5243351093451015857/photoid/5243351114783303842'/>
		<link rel='http://schemas.google.com/photos/2007#report' type='text/html' href='http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/reportAbuse?uname=njlouch&aid=5243351093451015857&iid=5243351114783303842'/>
		<gphoto:id>5243351114783303842</gphoto:id>
		<gphoto:version>1220812814313000</gphoto:version>
		<gphoto:position>1.0421024E9</gphoto:position>
		<gphoto:albumid>5243351093451015857</gphoto:albumid>
		<gphoto:width>640</gphoto:width>
		<gphoto:height>480</gphoto:height>
		<gphoto:size>41342</gphoto:size>
		<gphoto:client>picasa</gphoto:client>
		<gphoto:checksum>760e3fda</gphoto:checksum>
		<gphoto:timestamp>1220747089000</gphoto:timestamp>
		<exif:tags>
			<exif:imageUniqueID>2ff7ea92c91f6a0d6e8000b92655c836</exif:imageUniqueID>
		</exif:tags>
		<gphoto:commentingEnabled>true</gphoto:commentingEnabled>
		<gphoto:commentCount>0</gphoto:commentCount>
		<media:group>
			<media:title type='plain'>012448.jpg</media:title>
			<media:description type='plain'></media:description>
			<media:keywords></media:keywords>
			<media:content url='http://lh5.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgDvVOqKI/AAAAAAAAAEM/-Egc7UiyN9Q/012448.jpg' height='480' width='640' type='image/jpeg' medium='image'/>
			<media:thumbnail url='http://lh5.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgDvVOqKI/AAAAAAAAAEM/-Egc7UiyN9Q/s72/012448.jpg' height='54' width='72'/>
			<media:thumbnail url='http://lh5.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgDvVOqKI/AAAAAAAAAEM/-Egc7UiyN9Q/s144/012448.jpg' height='108' width='144'/>
			<media:thumbnail url='http://lh5.ggpht.com/njlouch/SMQgDvVOqKI/AAAAAAAAAEM/-Egc7UiyN9Q/s288/012448.jpg' height='216' width='288'/>
			<media:credit>Niki</media:credit>
		</media:group>
	</entry>
</feed>

Can anyone help please?

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Anyone?

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Aw come on? Nobody has done this?

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Ah well...

[AnthonySterling]

Well, to be honest its the name spaces which are throwing you off here. Name spaces are, IMO a real PIA for such small responses.

This is what I have, I was tasked to create an object that would take namespaced XML and remove all occurrences of the namespace.

It works, in fact, it works really well....I've extended the DOMDocument as to allow easier manipulation with it's methods.

I've tested it on internal, Youtube and Yahoo namespaced XML and it works a treat, but there's still work to be done I think.

Try it out with my blessings.

Class.NamespaceNulledXMLDocument.php

<?php
/**
 * @author		 Anthony David Sterling
 * 
 * @copyright	Anthony David Sterling
 * 
 * @version	 1.0
 * 
 * @desc		Removes namespace prefixes
 *				 programmatically based on the 
 *				 declared namespaces contained
 *				 within the document itself.
 * 
 * @todo		
 */
Class NamespaceNulledXMLDocument Extends DOMDocument
{
	/**
	 * @var		Boolean		Indicates whether we found any namespaces to remove.
	 */
	public $foundNamespaces = false;

	/**
	 * @var		Array		Holds all namespaces we found and processed.
	 */
	public $removedNamespaces = array();

	/**
	 * @param	String	$sXML	An XML document in string form.
	 * @return	 Void
	 */
	public function __construct( $sXML )
	{
		//--> Call the DOMDocument constructor to instantiate.
		parent::__construct();
		//--> Load our 'cleaned' XML into the DOMDocument.
		parent::loadXML( self::removeNamespaces($sXML) );
	}

	/**
	 * @param	String	$sXML	An XML document in string form.
	 * @return	String
	 */
	private function removeNamespaces( $sXML )
	{
		//--> Collecting all 'declared' namespace prefixes from within the XML document itself.
		$aNamespaces = ( preg_match_all( '/(?<=xmlns:).*?(?==)/' , $sXML , $aMatches , PREG_PATTERN_ORDER ) ) ? $aMatches[0] : array();
		//--> Before continuing, we'll check if we actually have any prefixes to remove.
		if( count($aNamespaces) > 0 )
		{
			//--> Logging the fact we found some namespaces to remove.
			$this->foundNamespaces = true;
			//--> Walking through each of the matched namespace prefixes and removing the prefix from every element.
			foreach ( $aNamespaces as $sNamespace )
			{
				//--> Log the namespace we are processing.
				$this->removedNamespaces[] = $sNamespace;
				//--> Replace any node with a namespace.
				$sXML =  preg_replace( "%(?<=<|</){$sNamespace}:%" , '' , $sXML );
				//--> Replace any attribute with a namespace.
				$sXML =  preg_replace( "/(?<=\\s){$sNamespace}:(?=.*?=\".*?\")/" , '' , $sXML );
			}
			//--> Return the new, clean, all singing, all dancing namespace nulled XML.
			return $sXML;
		}
		else
		{
			//--> Hmm, no namespaces to remove, so we'll just return the original XML that was supplied.
			return $sXML;
		}
	}
}
?>

Usage.php

<?php
//--> Load the class.
require_once( 'class.NamespaceNulledXMLDocument.php' );
//--> Obtain the namespaced XML.
$sXMLData = @file_get_contents('sample.xml');
//--> Create a NamespaceNulledXMLDocument, passing it the namespaced XML.
$oXML = new NamespaceNulledXMLDocument( $sXMLData );
//--> Using DOMDocument methods, format the output.
$oXML->formatOutput = true;
//--> Output the XML.
echo $oXML->saveXML();
?>

Enjoy!

SilverB.

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Thank you - will try this out tonight :)

[AnthonySterling]

No problem, just let me know how it goes... :D

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Please excuse m noobishness... Is this correct?

<?php
//--> Load the class.
require_once( 'class.NamespaceNulledXMLDocument.php' );
//--> Obtain the namespaced XML.
$sXMLData = @file_get_contents('localfeed.xml');
//--> Create a NamespaceNulledXMLDocument, passing it the namespaced XML.
$oXML = new NamespaceNulledXMLDocument( $sXMLData );
//--> Using DOMDocument methods, format the output.
$oXML->formatOutput = true;
//--> Output the XML.
//echo $oXML->saveXML();
$myXML = $oXML->saveXML();
foreach($myXML>entry as $track){
	echo('<b><a href="'.$track->id.'">'.$track->title.'</a></b>');
	echo('<b>'.$track->summary.'</b>');
	echo('<img src="'.$track->content->href.'">');
}
?>

[AnthonySterling]

Here you go Nik, a quick demonstration for you.

<?php

require_once('class.NamespaceNulledXMLDocument.php');

$sData = @file_get_contents('localFeed.xml');

$oDocument = simplexml_import_dom( new NamespaceNulledXMLDocument( $sData ) );

echo sprintf("<h1>Album %s by %s</h1>\r\n",(String)$oDocument->name,(String)$oDocument->user);
echo '<hr />';

foreach ($oDocument->entry as $oEntry)
{
	echo sprintf("\r\n<h2>%s</h2>\r\n",(String)$oEntry->title);
	echo '<ul>';
	echo sprintf("<li>%s: %s</li>\r\n",'Height',(Integer)$oEntry->height);
	echo sprintf("<li>%s: %s</li>\r\n",'Width',(Integer)$oEntry->width);
	echo sprintf("<li>%s: %s bytes.</li>\r\n",'Size',(Integer)$oEntry->size);
	echo "</ul>\r\n";
	echo sprintf('<a href="%s" title="%s" target="_blank">Download</a>',(String)$oEntry->content['src'],(String)$oEntry->title);
}

?>

I've used the sample XML you provided in post #4 as a base.

I've basically, obtained the XML data (a local file called localFeed.xml), then passed that data to my class which creates an object with all the name spaces removed. We then pass that object to the simplexml_import_dom() function, which converts the DOM Document to a SimpleXML object for easier access.

We can now use any of the SimpleXML functions on our object ($oDocument).

Then we just iterate through the entries delivering the required data as needed.

Just so you're aware, you will unable to use the image paths supplied by the feed to embed images on another site. Google / Picasa deliver headers to the requesting agent to force download the image.

I guess this is to stop people doing what you are attempting.

You could bypass these headers, but that would be another lesson!

Feel free to pester me for advice.

SilverB.

Edited September 24, 2008 by SilverBulletUK

[AnthonySterling]

Actually, here's a solution I provided for this problem a little while back here on Neowin.

[+Nik Louch Subscriber²]

Thank you so much.

With reference to your header sorting script - Please see above link - am getting an error.

Fatal error: Call to undefined function curl_init() in C:\wamp\www\displaypic.php on line 3

Sorry - didn't enable CURL!

[AnthonySterling]

You don't have cURL installed, try this.

demo.php

<?php
require_once('class.NamespaceNulledXMLDocument.php');
$sData = @file_get_contents('localFeed.xml');
$oDocument = simplexml_import_dom( new NamespaceNulledXMLDocument( $sData ) );
echo sprintf("<h1>Album %s by %s</h1>\r\n",(String)$oDocument->name,(String)$oDocument->user);
echo "<hr />\r\n";
foreach ($oDocument->entry as $oEntry)
{
	echo sprintf("<h2>%s</h2>\r\n",(String)$oEntry->title);
	echo '<ul>';
	echo sprintf("<li>%s: %s</li>\r\n",'Height',(Integer)$oEntry->height);
	echo sprintf("<li>%s: %s</li>\r\n",'Width',(Integer)$oEntry->width);
	echo sprintf("<li>%s: %s bytes.</li>\r\n",'Size',(Integer)$oEntry->size);
	echo "</ul>\r\n";
	echo sprintf('<img src="picasaImage.php?picasaImage=%s" alt="%s" />',base64_encode((String)$oEntry->content['src']),(String)$oEntry->title);
}
?>

picasaImage.php

<?php
if( isset($_GET['picasaImage']) )
{
	$sImageURL = base64_decode( $_GET['picasaImage'] );
	if( $sImageData = @file_get_contents($sImageURL) )
	{
		header( 'Expires: Mon, 26 Jul 1997 05:00:00 GMT' );
		header( 'Last-Modified: ' . gmdate( 'D, d M Y H:i:s' ) . ' GMT' );
		header( 'Content-Type: image/jpg' );
		header( 'Cache-Control: no-store, no-cache, must-revalidate' );
		header( 'Cache-Control: post-check=0, pre-check=0', false );
		header( 'Pragma: no-cache' );
		echo $sImageData;
		exit;
	}
}
exit;
?>

Place both of those on your server, it should do the trick.

SilverB.

Edited September 24, 2008 by SilverBulletUK