We're Talkin' APIs

Okay, so let's say you had this API thing for Swivel.

What would you build?

Comments

[Mark Woodman]

I would like to build charts that pull from a dynamic data source and cache the results. I'd like to use the API to ping the charts when the data is updated or added.

[visnu]

i would build a slurper of random things about myself, e.g. my cingular bill, and have it update automatically and tell me, say, how many minutes i use and if it's correlated to the outside temperature. and if the raccoons in the area are interested in going fishing this weekend.

[huned]

even though i asked the question, i still have an idea about my killer apps for a swivel api.

i'd love to mash historical annotations onto data to help me see cause-effect relationships.

for example, when palm inc's stock price fell 5% on jan 9th, you see a little text snippet that says apple announced its iphone.

[Tao Ge]

i need an api that make it easy to throw up data entry mini-web-sites.
i want to throw up a quick web page that lets me enter my daily weight, excercise time, sleep time, world of warcraft time etc - something personalized to me and have it all updated in swivel with graphs and comparisons to other people's.
and i can see throwing up a web page for say, ur weekly poker games or whatever else stats u want to keep track of.

[J. Kruger]

Some overlap here...

I'd like to build a private app that collects and compares my personal data, especially financials. I'm in the process of making several small, but significant life changes (better power usage, eating in) and I'd like to see how all that ties in to the bottom line. Especially since I'm a freelancer and very conscientious about my budget.

For my teaching studio, I'd like to me able to graph and track completions of exercises and whatnot - it'd help me fine-tune my various lesson plans.

On a larger scale, I'd like to pool together resources on just one city/county -- housing rates, crime rates, weather, school performance, etc. I've been involved in a lot of house-hunting for various relatives and an app that pulled all this together would be very helpful to weigh the pros and cons of a new area.

[L.Taylor]

An idea I had would be to pull down statistics with the flex framework and combine that data with flash video, to connect the experience with information. Not automatable at this point, but would provide the ability to annotate in a new way. Imagine a graph where each of the points could play footage of a key event associated with the data.

[Apatar Data Mashup Integration]

Do you have an API already? I would build a Swivel connector within Apatar Data Mashup Integration, an open source software to join your desktop data with the web. Swivel users would be able to update their data at Swivel using scheduler already available in Apatar, and upload data to Swivel from any XML, CSV, MySQL, MS SQL, Oracle, SalesForce.com, Flickr, even Amazon using free open source Apatar. All without coding. A free download is available at http://www.apatar.com. Please email me when API will be available, I would get to work on Swivel connector right away. You can find me at my blog http://www.apatar.com/blogs/renat/.

Renat Khasanshyn

[IsabelG]

And I would then use apatar to upload data regularly.