Can't get additional SKY API parameters to work

Joel Shapiro

Hi all

I'm working on the: Academics student enrollment list

When I pull for a student, I get 19 records returned. I only want the 14 "Academics" records, so I try adding query parameter "offering_description" with value "Academics", but it's still returning 19 records.

https://api.sky.blackbaud.com/school/v1/academics/enrollments/12345?offering_description=Academics

Is "offering_description" not the correct parameter name? That's what shows in the returned array:

"offering_description": "Academics"

What am I doing wrong?

TIA, -Joel

Steven Cinquegrana

Hi Joel,

Unfortunately, you can't just add query parameters to API endpoint calls. The only supported parameters for this call, as per the doco, are user_id and school_year. So if you add offering_description as a parameter it will just be be ignored, which is what you're seeing with regard to records returned.

As far as I know this applies right across the APIs and endpoints.

Cheers,

Steve Cinquegrana | CEO and Principal Developer | Protégé Solutions

Joel Shapiro

Steven Cinquegrana:

Hi Joel,

Unfortunately, you can't just add query parameters to API endpoint calls. The only supported parameters for this call, as per the doco, are user_id and school_year. So if you add offering_description as a parameter it will just be be ignored, which is what you're seeing with regard to records returned.

As far as I know this applies right across the APIs and endpoints.

Cheers,

Steve Cinquegrana | CEO and Principal Developer | Protégé Solutions

Hi Steve

Well thanks for that.

In the SKY API console, there's a link to “Add parameter”, and adding something there automatically appends it to the Request URL. So I had assumed…

Ah well. (seems like the UI could be fixed there ?)

Thanks, -Joel

Ben Lambert

Hi Joel,

Thanks for the feedback - it's a far point, and others have experience similar confusion.

Steve is correct in that our APIs don't support arbitrary parameters - just those listed in the documentation (and rendered in the UI on the Console page). Any additional parameters provided will be ignored.

Under the hood, the SKY API Console is part of our API Management vendor's solution (Microsoft). It's intended to be a bit of a general-purpose tool, so it provides some UX for things we don't necessarily support (like the “Add parameter” button). Now, in practice some of our APIs might support some not-yet-documented parameters for testing purposes (or while we're working on rolling out new functionality) so the UX is somewhat useful in that sense.

But it's good feedback for us, so thanks and please keep it coming!