Using canvas-api in ruby: Uploading files

The canvas-api is available via https://github.com/whitmer/canvas-api/blob/master/lib/canvas-api.rb Links to an external site. and documentation at https://github.com/whitmer/canvas-api Links to an external site.

You can easily get and install this package with:

gem install canvas-api

 

Start up Ruby and load the package

# irb
irb(main):001:0> require 'canvas-api' => true

Create an interface to the Canvas api. Note that the text after the code, in this case "=> true", is the response from Ruby.

irb(main):002:0> canvas = Canvas::API.new(:host => "https://kth.instructure.com", :token => "8...K") => true

Test this new interface by getting the user's profile

# irb(main):003:0> canvas.get("/api/v1/users/self/profile")
=> {"id"=>29, "name"=>"Gerald Q. Maguire Jr. temp", "short_name"=>"Gerald Q. Maguire Jr. temp",
    "sortable_name"=>"te, Gerald Q. Maguire Jr.",
    "avatar_url"=>"https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/52e6e0ae2260166c91cd528ba0c72263s=50&d=https%3A%2F%2Fkth.instructure.com%2Fimages%2Fmessages%2Favatar-50.png",
    "title"=>nil, "bio"=>nil, "primary_email"=>"maguire@kth.se", "login_id"=>"maguire@kth.se",
    "integration_id"=>nil, "time_zone"=>"Europe/Stockholm", "locale"=>nil,
    "calendar"=>{"ics"=>"https://kth.instructure.com/feeds/calendars/user_D3eZRBEctTqK7Yhd849duUymMQG6Nr1XvL99HTLs.ics"}}

Put a file into the user's folder unfiled.

irb(main):004:0> canvas.upload_file_from_local("/api/v1/users/self/files", File.open("maguire-march-2004-s.jpg"), :content_type => "image/jpeg")
=> {"id"=>6028, "folder_id"=>347, "display_name"=>"maguire-march-2004-s.jpg", "filename"=>"maguire-march-2004-s.jpg",
     "content-type"=>"image/jpeg", "url"=>"https://kth.instructure.com/files/6028/download?download_frd=1&verifier=zwFtqKgFpvY3TX3IApjwxfxnmrlSV6X5FwzleOhl",
     "size"=>61523, "created_at"=>"2016-06-23T02:41:35Z", "updated_at"=>"2016-06-23T02:41:36Z",
     "unlock_at"=>nil, "locked"=>false, "hidden"=>false, "lock_at"=>nil, "hidden_for_user"=>false,
     "thumbnail_url"=>nil, "modified_at"=>"2016-06-23T02:41:35Z", "locked_for_user"=>false,
     "preview_url"=>"/courses/11/files/6028/file_preview?annotate=0"}

Put the file into the class folder unfiled.

canvas.upload_file_from_local("/api/v1/courses/11/files/", File.open("maguire-march-2004-s.jpg"),:content_type => "image/jpeg")
=> {"id"=>6030, "folder_id" =>348;
    "display_name"=>"maguire-march-2004-s.jpg", "filename"=>"maguire-march-2004-s.jpg",
    "content-type"=>"image/jpeg",
    "url"=>"https://kth.instructure.com/files/6030/download?download_frd=1&verifier=NDF6LM8GTupvp6RVXY9ufiquPLJzQBVWaIfE7vBL",
    "size"=>61523, "created_at"=>"2016-06-23T03:10:06Z", "updated_at"=>"2016-06-23T03:10:07Z",
    "unlock_at"=>nil, "locked"=>false, "hidden"=>false, "lock_at"=>nil, "hidden_for_user"=>false,
    "thumbnail_url"=>"https://instructure-uploads-eu.s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/account_87790000000000001/thumbnails/6028/maguire-march-2004-s_thumb.jpg?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAJE5F5SJN3PUW3VNQ&Expires=1467169807&Signature=4pn8RKGReP3ys9ot7Z6mZITVX0M%3D",
    "modified_at"=>"2016-06-23T03:10:06Z", "locked_for_user"=>false, "preview_url"=>"/courses/11/files/6030/download?verifier=NDF6LM8GTupvp6RVXY9ufiquPLJzQBVWaIfE7vBL"}

Look at the resulting content of Folders:

unfiled-20160623.png

You can see the files is in the unfiled folder

unfiled-file-is-there-20160623.png

Specifying parent_folder_path

You can specify the parent_folder_path to put the file into a particular folder:

canvas.upload_file_from_local("/api/v1/courses/11/files/", File.open("maguire-march-2004-s.jpg"),
                              :content_type => "image/jpeg" :parent_folder_path=> "course files/GQM-test-20160623c")

inserted_according_to_path-201606243.png

#irb(main):020:0> canvas.upload_file_from_local("/api/v1/courses/11/files", File.open("Contents.html"),
:content_type => "text/html", :parent_folder_path=> "course files/GQM-test-20160623c")
=> {"id"=>6035, "folder_id"=>343, "display_name"=>"Contents.html", "filename"=>"Contents.html",
    "content-type"=>"text/html",
    "url"=>"https://kth.instructure.com/files/6035/download?download_frd=1&verifier=dQRWjmj3irHfukUAJHy0GZsbTEeYxOC8VOHVqx0F",
    "size"=>3168, "created_at"=>"2016-06-23T04:00:49Z",
    "updated_at"=>"2016-06-23T04:00:50Z", "unlock_at"=>nil, "locked"=>false,
    "hidden"=>false, "lock_at"=>nil, "hidden_for_user"=>false,
    "thumbnail_url"=>nil, "modified_at"=>"2016-06-23T04:00:49Z", "locked_for_user"=>false,
    "preview_url"=>"/courses/11/files/6035/download"}

The results can be see in the following:

inserted_according_to_path-20160623a.png