ScreenSteps Live API

ScreenSteps Live uses a REST API to make it very easy to get access to all of the manuals and lessons you have placed in spaces. It is important to understand that the API does not give you access to the admin area of your ScreenSteps Live account, only to the spaces you publish.

Example Use Cases

Some examples of how you might use the API are:

  • Display your ScreenSteps Live lessons on your own website
  • Display your ScreenSteps Live lessons behind a login on your own website
  • Provide contextual help inside of your web application
  • Integrate your ScreenSteps Live lessons into a 3rd party application such as a help desk or knowledge base
  • Display your ScreenSteps Live lessons inside of your desktop application

Implementation

Before you can access any of your lessons you will need to put them into a manual in a space. After that you simply request the url for the asset you are looking for. The base url for all of your requests will be your account url at ScreenSteps Live, e.g. http://account.screenstepslive.com. Here are some examples:

URL Result
/s Lists all spaces on your account
/s/:space_id_or_permalink List the manuals in a space.
/s/:space_id_or_permalink/m/:manual_id_or_permalink List the table of contents for a manual.
/s/:space_id_or_permalink/m/:manual_id_or_permalink/l/:lesson_id View a lesson in a manual.
/s/:space_id_or_permalink/tags?tag=:tag_name View lessons with a specific tag in a space.
/s/:space_id_or_permalink/m/:manual_id_or_permalink/tags?tag=:tag_name View lessons with a specific tag in a manual.
/s/:space_id_or_permalink/searches?text=:search_string Search lessons in a space.
/s/:space_id_or_permalink/m/:manual_id_or_permalink/searches?text=:search_string Search lessons in a manual.

When searching spaces and manuals you can also optionally pass in a tag parameter in the query string to restrict the search to a specific tag.

All of these requests will return an XML representation of the data you are requesting.

Creating Tasks

You can also create tasks using the ScreenSteps Live API. Tasks are created via a post request to the following url:

URL Result
/s/:space_id_or_permalink/tasks Create a task in a space

You should pass up an array of task values. The title attribute is required. The description element is optional. Your new task xml might look like this:

<task>
  <title>My New task</title>
  <description>An optional description</description>
</task>

Additional Resources

We have a complete ScreenSteps Live API manual with information about:

  • Preparing authentication headers
  • Example xml responses
  • Links to libraries for PHP and Ruby

View the ScreenSteps Live API Reference Manual