A new API call to find specific items and deprecating "store_duration"

[Ben Dodson]

Hey Folks,

We've got two bits of API news for you today. First off, we've created a new API call that allows you to find a specific number of an item (i.e. you could search for Bearded Lady #1). You can find details and an interactive version at http://wallab.ee/developers/explorer/?call=/itemtypes/12/number/1 but it should be fairly straightforward. Simply provide the item_type_id and number you want, and you'll get back the exact same details as you would from making a call to /items/# (i.e. you'll get everything you would if you'd provided the exact item_id). Hopefully that will be useful to some of you and will remove the need to crawl through our item database ;)

The second bit of news is that we are deprecating the "store_duration" attribute on items. This used to be the number of minutes that an item would stay in the store for but with our recent speed up, we decided to shake things up a bit by having this be randomly decided when the item enters a Store. For example, where in the past "Pipe" would always be in for 4 minutes, it will now be decided when it enters a Store whether it should last anywhere from 1 to 6 minutes. So, you might see "Pipe" in for 2 minutes 30 seconds and then the next time it shows up it may be there for 4 minutes and 19 seconds. Should add a bit more randomness and changeability to the Store and removes an attribute that may have been hard to explain in your applications. If you can remove any reference from your apps and make sure they can handle the attribute not being present that would be great. We'll remove it completely in a few months.

Shout if you have any queries,

Ben

[Kyle Horton]

Ben,

Thanks for the item number call!  Previously it seemed the only way to manage this was by creating our own versions of the database (highly undesirable).

-K

[Tod Cole]

Is the duration still anywhere from 1 to 6 minutes?  I seem to recall that the duration was different.  Something like 45 seconds to 4 1/2 minutes.  Or am I just randomly creating times?

[Ben Dodson]

It varies. Sometimes they have been as short as 8 seconds (for Mystery Box in patriotic colours on Independence Day) but currently it’s a random time between 32 and 115 seconds. Of course, this may change again in future as we often tweak the parameters.

Ben

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