Collections Online API

Collections Online API

GET /search

Search all collections.

Parameters

Name	Type	Required	Description
q	string	Yes	Search term
page[number]	integer	No	Zero indexed pagination page number to retrieve
page[size]	integer	No	Pagination page size (default 50)

Facet filter parameters

(Plural parameters are optionally multiple)

To comply with the jsonapi spec these filters are also available as filter[PARAM_NAME].

All

Name	Type	Required	Description
date[from]	date	No	e.g. 1829, 1900-12 or 1984-04-19
date[to]	date	No	e.g. 1829, 1900-12 or 1984-04-19
places	string	No	Associated geographical places

Objects

Name	Type	Required	Description
type	string	No	e.g. Model locomotive
people	string	No	Associated people e.g. Robert Stephenson
organisations	string	No	ALIAS for "people" e.g. Liverpool & Manchester Railway
categories	string	No	e.g. Locomotives and Rolling Stock
museum	enum	No	NRM, SMG, NMeM or MSI
on_display	booelan	No	Whether object is currently on display
location	string	No	Object's current museum location (only if on_display)

People

Name	Type	Required	Description
birth[place]	string	No	Name of place person was born
birth[date]	date	No	ALIAS for "date[from]"
death[date]	date	No	ALIAS for "date[to]"

Documents

Name	Type	Required	Description
type	string	No	e.g. Engineering
people	string	No	Associated people e.g. Robert Stephenson
organisations	string	No	ALIAS for "people" e.g. Liverpool & Manchester Railway
archive	string	No	Name of archive
formats	string	No	e.g. bound volume, large format document or photograph
creator	string	No	Name of creator
image_licences	string	No	Licence types for imagery e.g. CC BY-NC-SA

Example

GET /search?q=Charles&page[number]=3&page[size]=1 HTTP/1.1

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/vnd.api+json

{
  "meta": {
    "total-pages": 8
  },
  "links": {
    "first": "http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/search?q=Charles&page[number]=0&page[size]=1",
    "last": "http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/search?q=Charles&page[number]=8&page[size]=1",
    "prev": "http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/search?q=Charles&page[number]=2&page[size]=1",
    "next": "http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/search?q=Charles&page[number]=4&page[size]=1"
  },
  "data": [
    {
      "type": "agent",
      "id": "smga-agent-26803",
      "score": null,
      "attributes": {
        "description": [
          {
            "type": "biography",
            "value": "Charles Knight was born in Windsor in 1791, the son of a bookseller and printer, to whom he was apprenticed in 1805. He worked with his father for three years, learning the print trade. In 1810, Knight founded an unsuccessful reading club for young men in Windsor. On completion of his apprenticeship in 1812, he became the joint proprietor with his father and the sole editor of the Windsor and Eton Express, the borough's first newspaper. In 1818 he was appointed as an overseer of the poor. This role perhaps influenced his denouncement, in 1819, of cheap publications as irreligious and anti-government. Knight called for the provision of more ‘healthful’ literature, and in 1820 he started publication of a monthly serial entitled the Plain Englishman. This was followed in 1823 by Knight's Quarterly Magazine. From 1827 Knight was a reader and superintendent for the publications of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge (SDUK), and the following year he undertook a tour of the midlands industrial towns to organize local committees for the SDUK. In 1832 Knight began publication of the Penny Magazine, which was aimed primarily at a working-class readership and served up a wholesome diet of informative articles on art, literature, natural history, science, history, and biography (but not politics or religion). Knight became an early member of the Reform Club in 1834, and in 1837 played a part in the establishment of the penny post. He became publisher to the General Board of Health in 1853, and in 1855 acted as a juror at the Paris Universal Exhibition. Charles Knight died at Addlestone, Surrey on 9 March 1873. A gateway was erected in his memory at the cemetery adjacent to Bachelors Acre in Windsor, where he was buried."
          }
        ],
        "name": [
          {
            "primary": true,
            "type": "full name",
            "value": "Knight, Charles"
          }
        ],
        "summary_title": "Knight, Charles",
      }
    }
  ]
}

GET /search/objects

Search restricted to objects in the collections. See GET /search for parameters.

GET /search/agents

(ALIASED as GET /search/people)

Search restricted to people in the collections. See GET /search for parameters.

GET /search/archive

(ALIASED as GET /search/documents)

Search restricted to documents in the collections. See GET /search for parameters.