[nassau]

on my website, i want users to be able to tell me the name of an artist, song or album and then get a link to the iTunes Music Store generated. apple does just this on the linked page below:

http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/M.../itmsLinkMaker

this is exactly what i want but i can't copy it since it uses their database etc.

i'm using PHP for my website.

thankful for any help!

[Brad]

Good luck!

Without generating your own duplicate database or doing some funky script trickery that actually accesses Apple's own page and returns the results, I don't think this will be possible.

[nassau]

Originally Posted by Brad funky script trickery that actually accesses Apple's own page and returns the results

any ideas on how to do this? anyone?

[Wraven]

I know how to do this in a Java Servlet no sweat. Is there an HTTPConnection object in PHP? I could probably write a servlet that would do it. It'd actually be pretty cool (and good practice).

--EDIT--
My bad - what I was thinking would work would only take you to the second part of the link maker, not to the actual iTMS links themselves. Never mind.

I don't actually think you can do it - you would have to know the IDs of all the artists, songs, albums etc...

On second thought, you could, but you would have to run a looping HTTP query to retrieve the information and parse it and copy it into your own database, and I am pretty sure that is 1) illegal (perhaps could be argued as hacking) and 2) not nice to Apple because you would be HAMMERING that application.

[nassau]

what about putting the apple page into a frame or iframe on my own site. would it be possible to have PHP read the code from within that frame, since all the information IS displayed there (i can manually copy and paste it if i were so inclined)?

possible?

[Wraven]

I don't understand how this would get you the link to the iTMS song, album, or artist though?

OOOOhhhh - iframe - yes you COULD use that - but wouldn't it look like crap with scrollbars, etc... in order to make it fit?

[nassau]

or what about reading what is in the returned URL, if you check it out you'll see you can read some of the info from the URL on each subsequent page in the link-maker process. would that help?

[nassau]

Originally Posted by Wraven OOOOhhhh - iframe - yes you COULD use that - but wouldn't it look like crap with scrollbars, etc... in order to make it fit?

let's concentrate on making it work first and lookng good later
i really want this to work... also, check the "read the URL info" in my post above!

thanks

[Wraven]

Oh yeah - this WILL work - it's just two steps instead of one. This could be fun. I will take a look when I have a couple of hours to spare.

[nassau]

i just noticed, all the info you need, including the final link IS in the URL on each page.

[Wraven]

nassau,
That was what I was talking about above - take a closer look. The URLs on the second page only link to third page (dynamically generated) where you can get the ACTUAL links to the songs. It would be a double-lookup, but it is still doable.

[nassau]

the users on my page would still need to do a double lookup wince they need to specify which artist etc they are looking for.

hey, how do i read the URL of an iframe with PHP, if i know that i can do this! that's my only obstacle now that i think of it.....

i'm sure you'reon to the same thing

[nassau]

anyone?