Developer API

We recognize that Dabbleboard will be even more useful to users when integrated with other services, so we're offering this developer API. Now you can easily include Dabbleboard in your own service.
Step 1: Get a developer account
Step 2: Make API calls from your server
Step 3: Embed HTML

Developer_servers

Figure 1: Communication between your server, Dabbleboard's server and user's browser

Step 1: Get a developer account

Visit the Account page to generate a developer key. Review the Terms of Service.

Step 2: Make API calls from your server

Your server should make API calls to Dabbleboard's API servers to create users and drawings:

A user on Dabbleboard is associated with a unique user_id, and has a user_key to limit access to the account. Each user has his/her dedicated personal library of drawings. The user you create on Dabbleboard should have a 1:1 correspondence with a user you have on your own service.
A drawing on Dabbleboard is associated with a unique user_id-drawing_id pair, and has a drawing_key to limit access to it. Drawings may be created with API calls *OR* by users themselves when they manually add drawings to their personal library pane.

Developer_namespace

Figure 2: Namespaces for dev_id > user_id > drawing_id

You can control access to user accounts and drawings using user_key's and drawing_key's, which are like passphrases. API calls are made using http requests with parameters, and responses are returned in XML. E.g. you can obtain a list of all drawings using the following request (replace values of dev_id and other parameters with your own ones):

http://api.dabbleboard.com/api/list_drawings?dev_id=billgates&dev_key=abcdefgh

The API Admin Control Panel allows one to manually perform the API calls. Developers may find it handy when testing their code. Non-developers can use it to take advantage of the API, without having to learn how to program.

API functions

All functions

Parameter	Description
dev_id	Developer ID, same as your login at Dabbleboard.
dev_key	Developer key, which you generated in Step 1.
signature	Optional, use instead of dev_key; provides added security by never sending dev_key in plain text. Change the option to require signatures on your Account page. To compute the signature: (i) Sort parameters in dictionary order. E.g. for create_user: {user_id="john", user_key="black", dev_id="billgates"} => {dev_id="billgates", user_id="john", user_key="black"} (ii) Concatenate parameter values. "billgatesjohnblack" (iii) Append the dev_key at the end. "billgatesjohnblack"+dev_key => "billgatesjohnblackabcdefgh" (iv) Compute the hex MD5 hash. MD5("billgatesjohnblackabcdefgh") => "9f24a0c6f5eb6cdf54e3ebdad8a989d1"

Sample response:

<result>
<status>pass</status>
</result>

create_user method: POST

Parameter	Description
user_id	Unique ID (alphanumeric) for user being created
user_key	Key (up to 64 characters) to control access to user's library. We recommend using at least an MD5 hash to create keys.

list_users method: GET
No additional parameters
Sample response:

<result>
<user><user_id>john</user_id><user_key>abcdefgh123</user_key></user>
<user><user_id>tim</user_id><user_key>abc</user_key></user>
<status>pass</status>
</result>

update_user method: POST

Parameter	Description
user_id	User ID for user being updated
user_key	New key value.

delete_user method: POST

Parameter	Description
user_id	User ID for user being deleted; drawings created by user are also deleted

create_drawing method: POST

Parameter	Description
user_id	User ID that drawing is created under
drawing_id	Unique ID (unsigned integer) for drawing being created
drawing_key	Key (up to 64 characters) to control access to drawing. We recommend using at least an MD5 hash to create keys.
copy_user_id	Optional, use if creating copy. Source drawing's user ID
copy_drawing_id	Optional, use if creating copy. Source drawing's drawing ID

list_drawings method: GET
No additional parameters
Sample response:

<result>
<drawing><user_id>john</user_id><drawing_id>0</drawing_id><drawing_key>0000</drawing_key></drawing>
<drawing><user_id>john</user_id><drawing_id>1</drawing_id><drawing_key>1111</drawing_key></drawing>
<drawing><user_id>tim</user_id><drawing_id>0</drawing_id><drawing_key>00000000</drawing_key></drawing>
<drawing><user_id>tim</user_id><drawing_id>1</drawing_id><drawing_key>11112222</drawing_key></drawing>
<status>pass</status>
</result>

update_drawing method: POST

Parameter	Description
user_id	User ID that drawing is created under
drawing_id	Drawing ID for drawing being updated
drawing_key	New key value.

delete_drawing method: POST

Parameter	Description
user_id	User ID that drawing is created under
drawing_id	Drawing ID for drawing being deleted

Step 3: Embed HTML

Instantiate Dabbleboard in your webpages using html like this (replace values of dev_id and other parameters with your own ones):

<iframe width="640" height="480" style="border:none" src=
"http://api.dabbleboard.com/api/iframe?dev_id=billgates&user_id=john&user_key=black&drawing_user_id=tim&drawing_id=1&drawing_key=1111222&width=640&height=480"
></iframe>

Parameter	Description
width	Width of the embedded swf. The swf will automatically lay out the toolbar buttons for any width. Minimum value = 600
height	Height of the embedded swf. Minimum value = 400
dev_id	Developer ID, same as your login at Dabbleboard
user_id	Unique ID (alphanumeric) for user; determines which user's library is loaded.
user_key	Key (up to 64 characters) to control access to user's library.
drawing_user_id	User ID that drawing is created under. E.g. if John and Tim want to collaborate over one of Tim's drawings, Tim's HTML code will have user_id=drawing_user_id="tim" but John's will have {user_id="john", drawing_user_id="tim"}
drawing_id	Unique ID (unsigned integer) for drawing
drawing_key	Key (up to 64 characters) to control access to drawing.
hide_lib_pane	Specify "yes" to hide personal library pane, drawing name, etc. Optional, default = "no". Hide library pane for a result similar to the old API, or if you're creating a whiteboard on a public webpage with no user authentication.

Please contact us at partner@dabbleboard.com for any questions regarding the developer API. We're happy to also discuss your needs for customization or for running Dabbleboard on your own servers.