#A Golang Hacker News API Client

This is a wrapper client for the Hacker News API. It implements the most recent version, v0. It supports all resource requests.

##Usage From a command line, run $ go fetch github.com/munrocape/hn/client

You can then include it in any go file.

import "github.com/munrocape/hn/client"

Below is a quick reference of methods. Everything is explained in detail following.

c := hn.NewClient() // initialize the client

c.GetUser($username) // information regarding a user with that username

c.GetStory($id) // story item with id $id
c.GetComment($id) // comment with id $id

c.GetPoll($id) // poll with id $id
c.GetPollOpt($id) // Poll Opts are poll options - uuid $id

c.GetRecentJobStories($count) // get 0 <= $count <= 200 number of recent job stories
c.GetRecentAskStories($count)
c.GetRecentShowStories($count)

c.GetTopStories($count) // get 0 <= $count <= 500 top stories
c.GetNewStories($count)

c.GetMaxId() // id of the most recent item on HN
c.GetRecentChanges() // recently updated profiles and items

##API Specification and Code Examples The API specification can be found here. The below code examples are meant to demonstrate how to fetch resources as well as interact with them.

package main
import ("fmt"
        hn "github.com/munrocape/hn/client"
)
func main() {
  client := hn.NewClient()
  mostPopular := client.GetTopStories(1) // You can request up to 500 of the top stories at once
  commentCount := mostPopular.Descendants // Descendants corresponds to all comments
  topLevelComments := len(mostPopular.Kids) // Kids corresponds to top level comments on a story
  fmt.Printf("The most popular story on HN: %s\nComment Count: %d\nTop Level Comment Count: %d", mostPopular.Title, commentCount, topLevelComments) // Gotta print out to make sure it compiles ;)
}

##Structs In the HNverse of resources, there are Items and Users.

###Users Users, as you may have guessed, represent user accounts.

type User struct {
	Id        string `json:"id"`
	Delay     int    `json:"delay"`
	Created   int    `json:"created"`
	Karma     int    `json:"karma"`
	About     string `json:"about"`
	Submitted []int  `json:"submitted"` // This represents the ids of all the items they have submitted
}

To get the information on a specific user:

user, err := client.GetUser("munrocape")

###Items Items, on the other hand, may be slightly more vague. In fact, an Item represents a superset of attributes as follows:

type Item struct {
	Id          int    `json:"id"` // A UUID. if x > y then x was created after y.
	Deleted     bool   `json:"deleted"` // Whether or not the item was deleted
	Type        string `json:"type"` // one of {story, comment, poll, pollopt}
	By          string `json:"by"` // Account who submitted the item
	Time        int    `json:"time"` // UNIX time of submission
	Text        string `json:"text"` // Body of the submission
	Dead        bool   `json:"dead"` // Whether or not the item was killed
	Parent      int    `json:"parent"` // Parent - could be a comment or poll
	Kids        []int  `json:"kids"` // Top level comments
	Url         string `json:"url"` // External link. URL of item is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id={Item.Id}
	Score       int    `json:"score"` // Current score of the item
	Title       string `json:"title"` // Title of the item
	Parts       []int  `json:"parts"` // Poll options
	Descendants int    `json:"descendants"` // Total comment count
}

For each respective Item and Item type, use the corresponding client.Get{ItemType}(id) method.

Items represent all the attributes that can make up a story, comment, poll, or poll option on HN. The "Type" field corresponds to one of those four objects. They are outlined below.

type Story struct {
	By          string `json:"by"`
	Descendants int    `json:"descendants"`
	Id          int    `json:"id"`
	Kids        []int  `json:"kids"`
	Score       int    `json:"score"`
	Time        int    `json:"time"`
	Title       string `json:"title"`
	Url         string `json:"url"`
}

type Comment struct {
	By     string `json:"by"`
	Id     int    `json:"id"`
	Kids   []int  `json:"kids"`
	Parent int    `json:"parent"`
	Text   string `json:"text"`
	Time   int    `json:"time"`
}

type Poll struct {
	By          string `json:"by"`
	Descendants int    `json:"descendants"`
	Id          int    `json:"id"`
	Kids        []int  `json:"kids"`
	Parts       []int  `json:"parts"`
	Score       int    `json:"score"`
	Text        string `json:"text"`
	Time        int    `json:"time"`
	Title       string `json:"title"`
}

type PollOpt struct {
	By     string `json:"by"`
	Id     int    `json:"id"`
	Parent int    `json:"parent"`
	Score  int    `json:"score"`
	Text   string `json:"text"`
	Time   int    `json:"time"`
}

###Top and Recent Stories There also are a number of methods corresponding to story types.

top, _ := client.GetTopStories(50) // you can request between 1 and 500 top stories
new, _ := client.GetNewStories(200) // you can request between 1 and 500 of the newest stories
job, _ := client.GetRecentJobStories(42) // you can request between 1 and 200 recent job stories
ask, _ := client.GetRecentAskStories(42) // you can request between 1 and 200 recent ask stories
show, _ := client.GetRecentShowStories(42) // you can request between 1 and 200 recent show stories

You can also query for recent changes to profiles and items. You will receive a struct corresponding to the two arrays - a Changes struct.

type Changes struct {
	Items    []int    `json:"items"`
	Profiles []string `json:"profiles"`
}

changes, _ := client.GetChanges()