Glossary

Snaggr uses a few terms to define certain aspects of its service which may sound a bit confusing. This area hopes to aide developers to better understand this service's features. Below you will find a list of commonly used terms with their corresponding definitions.

This list will grow over time, so if you notice a term which isn't defined here, don't hesitate to point it out.

Terms

• API
  An API, or Application Programming Interface, is a kind of interface which allows two computers to interact which each other.
• APPLICATION
  If you are a 3rd-party developer and you wish to use the Snaggr API, you must provide us with some information regarding the system you wish to integrate. Once your application has been approved, the API key we give you will be permanently associated with your registered application.
• CONTAINER
  Some services require certain parameters to be formatted a certain way. This is typically done by providing these parameters in the form of JSON-based objects. We just call these objects containers.
• KEY
  A special token which is associated with a Snaggr user account. This token is used to uniquely identify your application when interacting with Snaggr's API.
• METER
  Some of Snaggr's services are metered, which is just another way of saying that you may only use a particular service a certain amount of times within a defined span of time. In other words, service foo.bar has a metered limit of 100 requests within a 24-hour period. A developer accessing a metered service will have a meter record associated with their API key. Once they make 100 requests, they will be unable to access the service until the 24-hour period has passed.
• OBJECT
  Within the Snaggr API, an object is the generic name of a specific piece of data. For instance, a single tag, image or search record within the system is considered an object.
• PROVIDER
  A provider is any website which offers an API that supports image searching. Snaggr uses many APIs like this to search for images on the net. It then takes these image results from the chosen list of providers and aggregates them into one, browsable, set of search results.
• REQUESTOR
  Any entity which initiates service requests to the Snaggr API.
• REST
  REST, or REpresentational State Transfer, is a type of software architecture which provides a standardized mechanism of communication between two different systems. In other words, it's a special type of API which Snaggr uses.
• SERVICE
  Within the context of Snaggr, a service is a word we use to describe a unique API method of interaction. For instance, post.search is a service which performs an image search.