API Operations (not just for clients anymore!)
TL;DR (executive summary): Provide API operations to allow clients to make better decisions and manage their VB business better.
Long Story:
I originally posted this as a ticket, but I was asked to move it over here.
Looks like your API is very much targeted to the client. Do you have (or plan to have) operations for talents? Something like GET /jobs?type="booking"&talentID="myid" which would get my bookings. Or maybe we don't even need the id, since I can only see jobs visible to me anyway, therefore any booking I see is necessarily mine. And leaving off the type filter would just show any, and all, casting, speedy, and booking jobs.
Basically, I seem to have problems getting emails on a timely basis, or even getting the alarm to sound when I have my dash up and a job becomes available. So, I'd like to write a program that will troll every 30 seconds or minute for available jobs and immediately text me. And my program would of course have to manage not flooding me with duplicate texts, but that's easy to do by saving the project-id and doing a comparison before sending new text.
Then I could write a clean-up program using an operation like GET /job/{project-id} which might return at least the status. Once it is fulfilled, disposed or expired (etc), I would remove it from the comparison list. That way if it became available again (due to VB or client rejection), I'd get a new text. And if it was never available again, my program wouldn't waste time comparing against it.
Other possible applications include:
• get all jobs from a client (awarded to anyone), to review client directions, revision requests, etc.
• get my total money earned (or paid) in a certain month.
• get all my reviews and list all samples that have been favorited.
It would also be helpful to get a list of jobs that client has gotten fulfilled at VB. For example, client 12345 has posted a job (maybe a booking or a speedy\casting). If I could use an API call to show the non-secret projects they have and how the talents fulfilled them, I could make a better decision about taking the job.
Here's something else I'd like to see. I have many examples, covering multiple types, 2 ages, and two accents. The more coverage across all three categories I have, the more likely a client will find me. Right now it is very tedious, scrolling down my sample page, noting the classification and listening the samples, so I can see what I have covered and what I'm missing. An API operation to list all the details of each sample would REALLY help.
I'd also like to pull my stats on a routine basis. That way I can see when the stats change and relate it to work that I did around that time. This way I can correlate my activity to the stat change and modify my behavior accordingly.
Here's another one. I'd like an API operation that summarizes number of jobs clients request by gender, age, and accent. I’d like see which combination of classifications are getting the most business. This one is a general request, so it wouldn't be tied to my account.
Something like: GET /jobs/summary with a request body:
{
"age":"middle-aged",
"gender":"female",
"language":"English-North American",
"start-date":"2015-JAN-1",
"end-date":"2015-JAN-31"
}
And would return response body:
{
job-summary {
"age":"middle-aged",
"gender":"female",
"language":"English-North American",
"start-date":"2015-JAN-1",
"end-date":"2015-JAN-31",
"total-jobs":315
}
}
Of course, you might also need supporting operations like GET /category/languages and GET /category/ages.
Really the sky is the limit!! I'm more than happy to test anything you get fired up...just give me an endpoint, an operation, and the parameters!!
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Thanks for the suggestion Cat! I let the product team know. :)
Allow talents to make better decisions, I meant!! (executive summary)
What's the status on this request? I have so many Ideas on things I could do, ranging from notifying myself when certain conditions occur to searching for reads clients liked or didn't like BEFORE accepting a job!
I checked back in with the developers and here's the basics of the what they said. We are not considering the implementation of an API for talents because we don't have enough demand to support its maintenance. Let's keep the thread open for now to see if we receive comments from more people on that front. We are busy working on features that will benefit more people in the community at the moment. While it's a good idea, we do not have much demand for it. Thank you very, very much for the suggestion!