JSON response from Google Analytics api

Question

I am using the google-api-ruby-client to get a response from the Google Analytics api, which is successful, the one thing I am a little confused with though is the response object. I would like to know how to drill down into specific keys and their values or even parse the response to make it more understandable.

Below is what I believe is the relevant part of the JSON response

"{\"kind\":\"analytics#gaData\",\"id\":\"https://www.googleapis.com/analytics/v3/data/ga?ids=ga:88893966&dimensions=ga:pagePath&metrics=ga:pageviews&filters=ga:pagePath%3D%3D/&start-date=2014-01-01&end-date=2014-07-22\",\"query\":{\"start-date\":\"2014-01-01\",\"end-date\":\"2014-07-22\",\"ids\":\"ga:88893966\",\"dimensions\":\"ga:pagePath\",\"metrics\":[\"ga:pageviews\"],\"filters\":\"ga:pagePath==/\",\"start-index\":1,\"max-results\":1000},\"itemsPerPage\":1000,\"totalResults\":1,\"selfLink\":\"https://www.googleapis.com/analytics/v3/data/ga?ids=ga:88893966&dimensions=ga:pagePath&metrics=ga:pageviews&filters=ga:pagePath%3D%3D/&start-date=2014-01-01&end-date=2014-07-22\",\"profileInfo\":{\"profileId\":\"88893966\",\"accountId\":\"53082810\",\"webPropertyId\":\"UA-53082810-1\",\"internalWebPropertyId\":\"85713348\",\"profileName\":\"All Web Site Data\",\"tableId\":\"ga:88893966\"},\"containsSampledData\":false,\"columnHeaders\":[{\"name\":\"ga:pagePath\",\"columnType\":\"DIMENSION\",\"dataType\":\"STRING\"},{\"name\":\"ga:pageviews\",\"columnType\":\"METRIC\",\"dataType\":\"INTEGER\"}],\"totalsForAllResults\":{\"ga:pageviews\":\"8\"},\"rows\":[[\"/\",\"8\"]]}"

which is obtained from

# make queries
result = client.execute(:api_method => api_method, :parameters => {
  'ids'        => PROFILE,
  'start-date' => Date.new(2014,1,1).to_s,
  'end-date'   => Date.today.to_s,
  'dimensions' => 'ga:pagePath',
  'metrics'    => 'ga:pageviews',
  'filters'    => 'ga:pagePath==/'
 })

 puts ap(result)

Also when I do:

puts ap(result.data.rows.inspect)
#returns
"[[\"/\", \"8\"]]"

and when i try

response = JSON.parse(result.data.totalsForAllResults)
puts ap(response)
# returns error
TypeError: no implicit conversion of #<Class:0x00000001950550> into String

I am wondering how I can format the response without the backslashes and how I would say get the total page views?

Answer 1

Your syntax is off.

If result is simply a string that is a json object, which it looks like above, what you want is:

response = JSON.parse(result)
ap response["totalsForAllResults"]["ga:pageviews"]

Looking at the google-api-ruby-client the result.data returns an object if parseable from api schema, a hash if you pass the media type "application/json", or a string otherwise. So you need to determine if you are accessing the response data as an object or a Hash. My example above parses the raw string into a ruby hash.

tl;dr; there are multiple ways to attain the data you want.

Answer 2

Yes, your syntax is off. It should look something like this.

https://www.googleapis.com/analytics/v3/data/ga?ids=ga:_____&dimensions=ga:date&metrics=ga:impressions,ga:adClicks,ga:adCost&start-date=2015-10-13&end-date=today

BaseUrl, id, metrics, start-date and end-date are required. And don't forget to insert the access_token as well.