TweetSearcher
Runs a search for Twitter™ entries that contain the given query. Access to the Twitter search API is rate-limited. Excessive searching in a given time period will result in search requests being denied. The exact rate limit information for the search API may be found at the search API documentation page: http://dev.twitter.com/docs/api/1.1/get/search/tweets
Output Ports
Upon successful completion of the search, the transformer will output a new feature for each tweet in the search results. Each output feature will contain several attributes:
_tweet_id: The identification number of the search result.
_tweet_user: The name of the Twitter user who created the search result.
_tweet_text: The text of the search result.
_tweet_created_at: The date and time of the status update. This will be formatted in the standard FME date/time format: YYYYMMDDHHMMSS
_tweet_search_result: The JSON text of the search result. This can be further examined via the JSONFragmenter and JSONExtractor transformers.
If the search could not be completed, the feature will be output through the Error output port, and will have the following new attributes:
_twitter_search_result: If a response was received from the Twitter server, it will be stored in this attribute.
_twitter_error: If the Twitter response contained an error message, it will be stored in this attribute.
Parameters
Search Parameters
Type a search query or select the name of an attribute that contains the query.
Select the type of Tweets to search for. The options are Recent, Popular and Mixed. The value of this parameter may affect the number of search results that are returned.
Specifies an upper bound on the number of search results returned, and therefore the maximum number of features output from the transformer.
Authentication Parameters
Note: For access outside of your network using a proxy server, use the Network tools in FME Options. From the Workbench menu, select Tools > FME Options > Network. For more information, see "Network" in the FME Workbench Help.
A valid Twitter username and password are required in order to access the Twitter search API.
Geocode Parameters
If this parameter is set to Yes, the transformer will restrict its search to geocoded tweets. These are tweets which have been tagged with lat/long location data. The center of gravity of the feature’s geometry will be used as the center point of the search area.
Note that Geocoded Tweets may also include non-geocoded tweets if a user has set their location in Twitter settings, and that location falls within the search parameters (but does not have proper lat/long coordinates).
In these cases, the TweetSearcher will add an additional attribute: _tweet_geo. To exclude these results, you can attach a Tester transformer to filter out non-geocoded Tweets. Set the test to _tweet_geo = "null".
When searching for geocoded tweets, these parameters control the radius of the search area. The units may be set to Kilometers or Miles, and only tweets within the search radius from the search center point will be returned.
Related Transformers
Editing Transformer Parameters
Using a set of menu options, transformer parameters can be assigned by referencing other elements in the workspace. More advanced functions, such as an advanced editor and an arithmetic editor, are also available in some transformers. To access a menu of these options, click beside the applicable parameter. For more information, see Transformer Parameter Menu Options.
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