How to retrieve posts from a WordPress Blog in an Android App?

Question

I'm trying to develop an Android app for browsing a Wordpress-powered blog I own. I'm trying to figure out how to retrieve posts and other information from the blog to display in the app. I've looked all over but I feel completely lost. Is this something that can be done entirely in Java/XML? If so, how?

Thank you!

Solution 1

Yes, it can be done.

One way is to use the xml-rpc api. Wordpress blogs have an xml-rpc api(which you need to enable on the Wordpress blog under "Settings - Writing"). You will also need to create a user on the blog, which you give at least read access, and for which you include the credentials in your app. From then on, you can do xml-rpc calls to your Wordpress blog(s).

If using this xml-rpc api is an option, take a look at this Java lib: http://code.google.com/p/wordpress-java/

You can get the blogposts using this lib like this:

String username = args[0];
String password = args[1];
String xmlRpcUrl = args[2];
Wordpress wp = new Wordpress(username, password, xmlRpcUrl);
List<Page> recentPosts = wp.getRecentPosts(10);

Also, the official Wordpress Android app is open source. Instructions to get it are at: http://android.wordpress.org/development/ You could use this source code as a starting point and adapt it to your needs.

Note that you can only use the xml-rpc api when you have a user with read access. If you do not have the credentials of a user with read access, you can't get the posts using the xml-rpc api. Fetching the rss feed and parsing the rss feed with some java lib would probably be your best bet then(check http://www.vogella.com/articles/RSSFeed/article.html on how to read an rss feed using Java).

Solution 2

As Integrating Stuff said, the 'net.bican:jwordpress:0.6.4' is what you need. Still, the example he gave is now deprecated. There is no more getRecentPosts(int) but getPosts(FilterPost).

So now the correct code is :

String username = args[0];
String password = args[1];
String xmlRpcUrl = args[2];
Wordpress wp = new Wordpress(username, password, xmlRpcUrl);
FilterPost filter = new FilterPost() ;
filter.setNumber(10);
List<Post> recentPosts = wp.getPosts(filter);

to know more check the example : https://github.com/canbican/wordpress-java/blob/bb4b60a008ee6d280aedd9174df4a657bff683ac/src/net/bican/wordpress/example/Main.java

Also, if you're using Gradle, check this dependencies problem you may face : https://github.com/canbican/wordpress-java/issues/54

Comments

[Argus9]

Thanks for a HUGELY thorough answer! I think the API will work best for me, but I'll look into modifying the Wordpress app too. Thanks again!

[aldo.roman.nurena]

the library isn't working for me. It is in both library project and dependent project but logcat says "noclassdeffounderror" with the "net.bican.wordpress.Wordpress" class. help please!

[Admin]

You need to create a folder called libs in your project and copy the jar file there and add it to your build path. There are other posts on this, I point you to stackoverflow.com/questions/1334802/…

[Adam Shiemke]

This helped a lot. Was trying to use their JSON API, but it doesn't allow anonymous access (this doesn't either, but I can have a user with limited privileges and handle the login transparently)

[MrMoog]

xml-rpc Wordpress API does not works with a read-only access user. I tried both wordpress android app and implementing myself. With administrator rights it is working, but I would like to read blog posts without hardcoding administrator credentials (obviously for security reasons). So I think that the only possibilities are using RSS feed parsing or REST HTML API.

[Salman Khan]

Hello All, I am also searching for something to login user into the wordpress account through APIs and then to create, edit & delete posts. Can anyone help me with that as I am unable to understand the above explanation.