Using Postman to try out the REST APIs

Discussion created by malcolm.murray on May 24, 2017
Latest reply on Feb 6, 2018 by Peter Love

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Has anyone had a play with postman to try out the REST APIS? I thought it might be nicer than a command-line solution like CURL (and has the advantage that it is easy to save and re-use queries).

https://www.getpostman.com

Having registered my own extension and then deployed the application on my server, I have managed to get it to create a token as follows

Creating a new GET or POST request and first selecting the Authorization Type to be OAUTH 2.0

If you click the Orange button Get New Access Token then a dialog box opens that should be populated as follows:

Token Name: anything_you_want
Auth URL: leave blank
Access Token URL: https://[your-server.com]/learn/api/public/v1/oauth2/token
Client ID: key set up when you defined your REST API
Client Secret: secret set up when you set up your REST API
Scope: leave blank
Grant Type: Client Credentials

I then ticked the box Request access token locally

When I click the Orange Request Token button I get a nice-looking response:

I have a token and an expiry time, all good so far.

When I then try and get some details of courses using the URL

https://[your-server.com]/learn/api/public/v1/courses?

and having clicked the Orange Use Token button, I get a 401 (Unauthorised) error on the request.

Yet I can see that the access_token is passed in the request.
Any suggestions?

TIA

Malcolm.

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Peter Love May 24, 2017 8:50 PM

Try clicking "Headers" and add:

Key = Authorization

Value = Bearer your_access_token

1 person found this helpful

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malcolm.murray @ Peter Love on May 25, 2017 7:53 AM

Thanks Peter,

That did the trick :-)

So in case anyone else is puzzling over this, after following the first two steps and getting a token, ignore the orange Use Token button

Instead just copy the long string that is the access_token value
Then as Peter suggested, click on the Headers tab

In the Key field type the word Authorization

In the Value field type the word Bearer followed by a space and then paste the access_token value you copied earlier

e.g. to create a String like Bearer oriQVvuQUyQZSnset1yiXFPRXNTC3DRx

Now when you press the blue Send button, after a pause you'll see JSON complete with results :-)

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tp36301 @ malcolm.murray on Oct 23, 2017 2:28 PM

Malcolm Murray (and Peter Love),

I had this same issue so I referred back to this and eventually was able to get it to accept the token using our test server.

I was able to use the updated token; however, I have some issues trying to apply additional scripts from the examples.

Were you able to get this to work as I did not for example see a JSON option to post and/or convert the cope examples?

Let me know what you find and thanks much for your help on this.

Cheers,

Toni P.

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Peter Love @ tp36301 on Oct 23, 2017 3:14 PM

Yes, it works fine.

Look for "Body". "raw", and JSON in the content-type menu.

Here is a course create:

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sdeyhim Feb 5, 2018 3:36 PM

I'm trying to get a token using postman by following the steps here, but it is not working. Here is what my request looks like

and here is the response I get back:

and when I set Client Authentication to "send as basicc Auth header" this is what I get:

Any idea what is wrong? Is there an easier way to get a token? I need this for a school project and I don't have a lot of experience in web development.

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Peter Love @ sdeyhim on Feb 6, 2018 3:47 PM

Has your application been registered with the Learn server? This needs to be done by an administrator, you cannot simply point your REST application at an arbitrary Learn server.

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sdeyhim @ Peter Love on Feb 6, 2018 4:37 PM

I have created an account and have registered my app through "Manage Your Application" page. That gave me a client id and a client secret, which I thought would be enough. So I have to contact the college server's admin and get registered with them as well.

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Peter Love @ sdeyhim on Feb 6, 2018 4:50 PM

Yes, you have to contact your college server's admin.

Or you could bring up you own Learn instance on AWS. See: Using the Blackboard Learn AMI for REST and LTI Development

1 person found this helpful

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8 Replies

Peter Love May 24, 2017 8:50 PM
Try clicking "Headers" and add:
Key = Authorization
Value = Bearer your_access_token
1 person found this helpful
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- malcolm.murray @ Peter Love on May 25, 2017 7:53 AM
  Thanks Peter,
  That did the trick :-)
  
  So in case anyone else is puzzling over this, after following the first two steps and getting a token, ignore the orange Use Token button
  Instead just copy the long string that is the access_token value
  Then as Peter suggested, click on the Headers tab
  In the Key field type the word Authorization
  In the Value field type the word Bearer followed by a space and then paste the access_token value you copied earlier
  e.g. to create a String like Bearer oriQVvuQUyQZSnset1yiXFPRXNTC3DRx
  Now when you press the blue Send button, after a pause you'll see JSON complete with results :-)
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  - tp36301 @ malcolm.murray on Oct 23, 2017 2:28 PM
    Malcolm Murray (and Peter Love),
    
    I had this same issue so I referred back to this and eventually was able to get it to accept the token using our test server.
    
    I was able to use the updated token; however, I have some issues trying to apply additional scripts from the examples.
    
    Were you able to get this to work as I did not for example see a JSON option to post and/or convert the cope examples?
    
    Let me know what you find and thanks much for your help on this.
    
    Cheers,
    
    Toni P.
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    - Peter Love @ tp36301 on Oct 23, 2017 3:14 PM
      Yes, it works fine.
      
      Look for "Body". "raw", and JSON in the content-type menu.
      
      Here is a course create:
      
      1 person found this helpful
      Like • Show 0 Likes0
      Actions
sdeyhim Feb 5, 2018 3:36 PM
I'm trying to get a token using postman by following the steps here, but it is not working. Here is what my request looks like

and here is the response I get back:

and when I set Client Authentication to "send as basicc Auth header" this is what I get:

Any idea what is wrong? Is there an easier way to get a token? I need this for a school project and I don't have a lot of experience in web development.
Like • Show 0 Likes0
Actions
- Peter Love @ sdeyhim on Feb 6, 2018 3:47 PM
  Has your application been registered with the Learn server? This needs to be done by an administrator, you cannot simply point your REST application at an arbitrary Learn server.
  Like • Show 0 Likes0
  Actions
  - sdeyhim @ Peter Love on Feb 6, 2018 4:37 PM
    I have created an account and have registered my app through "Manage Your Application" page. That gave me a client id and a client secret, which I thought would be enough. So I have to contact the college server's admin and get registered with them as well.
    Like • Show 0 Likes0
    Actions
    - Peter Love @ sdeyhim on Feb 6, 2018 4:50 PM
      Yes, you have to contact your college server's admin.
      
      Or you could bring up you own Learn instance on AWS. See: Using the Blackboard Learn AMI for REST and LTI Development
      1 person found this helpful
      Like • Show 0 Likes0
      Actions

Using Postman to try out the REST APIs

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