Get the checkin shout from Foursquare

Question

it's my first question here =)

I'm developing an application to get checkins near from a specific location. To do it obviously I've to pass the location using search method and for each venue I call the herenow method.

Basically I already got these checkins but furthermore I also want catch the user shout of each checkin. I'm correctly authenticated using oauth...

The only thing I know is that to do it I should have some type of signature, like is used in checkin published in another social networks (like Twitter). So... I dont know how to do it...

Just to know: I'm using Java language.

Answer 1

There isn't a way to get full check-ins near a specific location. Foursquare has strict user-privacy settings, so you can only access check-ins from users who have explicitly authorized your application.

Here-now is really the only public view into check-ins, and there are strict privacy rules on what you can do with it -- see the official api policies here . For example, you cannot keep the data for more than 3 hours.

If you want a public data set, then twitter is probably the best solution, as check-ins shared with public twitter accounts can be accessed via the API using the 'signature' attached to the URL. More details on that field here .

Here is an example check-in from myself with a signature field ('s').

Even with public check-ins, as the user has not authorized your application, the same api policies will apply.