Install Required Libraries
- Ensure you have Python 3.x installed in your environment. Use
pip to install the required packages.
- Install the
requests library for making HTTP requests to the Twitter API.
- Install the
tweepy library, which is commonly used for interfacing with Twitter. However, for Premium API, we will use requests primarily.
pip install requests tweepy
Configure Environment Variables
- Store your Twitter API credentials securely. Use environment variables or a configuration file to manage them.
- Set up the following variables:
TWITTER_CONSUMER_KEY, TWITTER_CONSUMER_SECRET, TWITTER_ACCESS_TOKEN, and TWITTER_ACCESS_TOKEN\_SECRET.
Build API Request
- Focus on constructing a proper HTTP request for querying historical tweets using the Twitter Premium Search API.
- Use the appropriate endpoint for the API tier you are using (e.g., Full Archive or 30-Day). Example endpoint:
https://api.twitter.com/1.1/tweets/search/fullarchive/[environment].json.
import os
import requests
from requests.auth import HTTPBasicAuth
def get_headers():
return {
'Authorization': f'Bearer {os.environ["TWITTER_BEARER_TOKEN"]}',
'Content-Type': 'application/json',
}
Define Search Parameters
- Specify the query parameters according to the type of data you need (keywords, from date, to date, etc.).
- Twitter Premium API uses a JSON body with fields like
'query', 'maxResults', and 'fromDate'.
def build_search_request():
search_request = {
'query': 'from:jack',
'maxResults': '10',
'fromDate': '202201010000',
'toDate': '202201312359'
}
return search_request
Make the API Call
- Use the
requests library to send a POST request with the JSON body and headers configured earlier.
- Ensure proper error-handling to capture issues like exceeding rate limits or authentication errors.
def fetch_tweets():
url = "https://api.twitter.com/1.1/tweets/search/fullarchive/your_environment_name.json"
try:
response = requests.post(url, headers=get_headers(), json=build_search_request())
response.raise_for_status() # Raises exception for HTTP error codes
return response.json()
except requests.exceptions.RequestException as e:
print(f"An error occurred: {e}")
return None
Process the Retrieved Data
- Once the tweets are fetched, parse the JSON response. You’ll typically look for the key 'results' which contains the retrieved tweets.
- Iterate through the results and extract the required information such as tweet content, creation date, user name, etc.
def process_tweets(data):
if not data:
return
for tweet in data.get('results', []):
print(f"Date: {tweet['created_at']}")
print(f"User: {tweet['user']['name']}")
print(f"Tweet: {tweet['text']}")
print("-" * 40)
Execute the Code
- Bring together the components in a main execution block or script that prepares the search request, makes the API call, and processes the results.
- Use the script to conduct your required historical data searches on Twitter using the Premium API.
def main():
tweets_data = fetch_tweets()
process_tweets(tweets_data)
if __name__ == "__main__":
main()
