For more details and for documentation, check out http://socrata.github.io/soda-ruby or our developer portal.

Installation

SODA is distributed as a gem, which is how it should be used in your app.

Include the gem and hashie in your Gemfile:

gem 'soda-ruby', :require => 'soda'

Quick Start

Create a new client. Register for an application token at http://dev.socrata.com/register.

client = SODA::Client.new({:domain => "explore.data.gov", :app_token => "CGxadgoQlgQSev4zyUh5aR5J3"})

Issue a filter query. 644b-gaut is the identifier for the dataset we want to access. The return object is an array of Hashie::Mash objects:

response = client.get("644b-gaut", {"$limit" => 1, :namelast => "WINFREY", :namefirst => "OPRAH"})

 #=> [#<Hashie::Mash appt_end_date="12/3/09 23:59" appt_made_date="12/2/09 18:05" appt_start_date="12/3/09 9:30" caller_name_first="SALLY" caller_name_last="ARMBRUSTER" last_updatedby="J7" lastentrydate="12/2/09 18:05" meeting_loc="WH" meeting_room="DIP ROOM" namefirst="OPRAH" namelast="WINFREY" post="WIN" release_date=1269586800 terminal_suffix="J7" total_people="10" type_of_access="VA" uin="U60816" visitee_namefirst="SEMONTI" visitee_namelast="STEPHENS">]

You can use other simple query SoQL methods found here: http://dev.socrata.com/docs/queries.html

client = SODA::Client.new({:domain => "soda.demo.socrata.com"})
magnitude_response = client.get("4tka-6guv", {"$where" => "magnitude > '3.0'"})

#=> [#<Hashie::Mash datetime="2012-09-14T09:28:55" depth="20" earthquake_id="12258012" location=#<Hashie::Mash latitude="19.7859" longitude="-64.0849" needs_recoding=false> magnitude="3.1" number_of_stations="6" region="north of the Virgin Islands" source="pr" version="0">, #<Hashie::Mash datetime="2012-09-14T07:58:39" depth="74" earthquake_id="12258011" location=#<Hashie::Mash latitude="19.5907" longitude="-64.1723" needs_recoding=false> magnitude="3.3" number_of_stations="4" region="Virgin Islands region" source="pr" version="0">, ... ]

datetime_response = client.get("4tka-6guv", {"$where" => "datetime > '2012-09-14T09:28:55' AND datetime < '2012-12-25T09:00:00'"})

#=> [#<Hashie::Mash datetime="2012-09-14T10:10:19" depth="8.2" earthquake_id="00388609" location=#<Hashie::Mash latitude="36.9447" longitude="-117.6778" needs_recoding=false> magnitude="1.7" number_of_stations="29" region="Northern California" source="nn" version="9">, #<Hashie::Mash datetime="2012-09-14T10:06:11" depth="6.4" earthquake_id="00388607" location=#<Hashie::Mash latitude="36.9417" longitude="-117.6903" needs_recoding=false> magnitude="1.7" number_of_stations="29" region="Central California" source="nn" version="9">, ... ]

All the field names have built in getter methods since the objects are Hashie::Mashes.

magnitude_response.first.number_of_stations   #=> "6"

Note that the return value is a string object.