| s | p_blank | o_blank |
|---|---|---|
| /id/statistical-geography/S02002122 | http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#type | geosparql: Geometry |
| /id/statistical-geography/S02002122 | geosparql: asWKT | POLYGON ((-4.698485032309069 55.66324224201715, -4.697973476877153 55.6627411346269, -4.697065179781622 55.66248245900446, -4.694064439672864 55.661856272744885, -4.693498702571987 55.66149116940201, -4.692979519375165 55.66041492733186, -4.693104813878489 55.658767228103834, -4.69262607871514 55.65781593951843, -4.693298535278069 55.65718993588551, -4.694717904454734 55.656790216161525, -4.69575421716676 55.65613822522198, -4.695720270630292 55.65564458751185, -4.694600019195204 55.6541501004505, -4.69434470636667 55.65366496672538, -4.695736457672082 55.65318996571917, -4.696832758971735 55.65314980765969, -4.69696365480929 55.653661592018786, -4.697916118687413 55.65359179645012, -4.698604655400609 55.652648489305705, -4.697167030894495 55.65287119199607, -4.6965532470728935 55.65180603347972, -4.699081840726615 55.6515886066954, -4.69938370574157 55.65212949781251, -4.700653284351036 55.651786954261, -4.700549818987987 55.65120572380871, -4.705538111096465 55.65135026105912, -4.706239359566035 55.65034487439366, -4.706397670581281 55.64979139876342, -4.707534838308347 55.650041120529764, -4.709197818009524 55.65304644842651, -4.70822233502661 55.65319383878722, -4.708504483317617 55.65382654285363, -4.708619058696918 55.65479407831163, -4.708175564382983 55.655738711513735, -4.707290645502321 55.655821792039404, -4.707033406019682 55.65715719684056, -4.708489217631699 55.65728685261201, -4.709649866827833 55.65774661105789, -4.709869838703878 55.65954850616438, -4.710027618110422 55.65976075179301, -4.70983506934276 55.662321888149016, -4.709333718838088 55.66628399338496, -4.708919992605221 55.66605043341057, -4.708177528749507 55.66451176317439, -4.7061969637746355 55.66208355387103, -4.704636090016075 55.662712801354814, -4.7006648361975865 55.6627987560096, -4.699822924138833 55.66234987397175, -4.698926737832646 55.66272915025136, -4.698485032309069 55.66324224201715)) |
The most flexible way to access the data is by using SPARQL, a query language, analagous to SQL for relational databases, for retrieving and manipulating data from graph databases like ours. We support SPARQL 1.1 query syntax. Many online tutorials are available.
To submit a SPARQL query from your code, you issue an HTTP GET or POST to our endpoint:http://statistics.gov.scot/sparql, with the query itself as a url-encoded parameter called query.
For example, to run the following simple SPARQL query and get the results as JSON:
SELECT * WHERE {?s ?p ?o} LIMIT 10Issue a POST to the endpoint, with the query in the body, and an Accept header of sparql-results+json:
POST http://statistics.gov.scot/sparql HTTP/1.1
Host: statistics.gov.scot
Accept: application/sparql-results+json
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded
query=SELECT+%2A+WHERE+%7B%3Fs+%3Fp+%3Fo%7D+LIMIT+10Issue a GET to the following URL (note the .json extension - see the formats section for more detail on this):
GET http://statistics.gov.scot/sparql.json?query=SELECT+%2A+WHERE+%7B%3Fs+%3Fp+%3Fo%7D+LIMIT+10Scroll down to the end of this page for examples of both of these methods in a few different languages.
As with other aspects of our API, to get the data in different formats, you can use either (a) a format extension or (b) an HTTP Accept header. Available result formats depend on the type of SPARQL query. There are four main forms:
SELECT queries return tabular results, and the formats available reflect this:
| Format | Extensions | Accept Headers |
|---|---|---|
| XML | .xml |
application/xml, application/sparql-results+xml |
| JSON | .json |
application/json, application/sparql-results+json |
| Text | .txt, .text | text/plain |
| CSV | .csv | text/csv |
CONSTRUCT and DESCRIBE queries return graph data, so the results are available in the same formats as our resource APIs:
| Format | Extensions | Accept Headers |
|---|---|---|
| RDF/XML | .rdf | application/rdf+xml |
| N-triples | .nt, .txt, .text | application/n-triples, text/plain |
| Turtle | .ttl | text/turtle |
| JSON-LD | .json | application/ld+json, application/json |
ASK queries return a boolean result:
| Format | Extensions | Accept Headers |
|---|---|---|
| XML | .xml | application/xml, application/sparql-results+xml |
| JSON | .json | application/json, application/sparql-results+json |
| Text | .txt, .text | text/plain |
We accept page and per_page parameters for paginating the results of SELECT queries (we automatically modify your query to apply LIMIT and OFFSET clauses). For other query types (i.e. DESCRIBE, CONSTRUCT, ASK), pagination like this doesn’t make so much sense, so these parameters are ignored.
For requests made through the website (i.e. HTML format), the page size is defaulted to 20. For requests to our sparql endpoint for data formats (i.e. non-HTML), there will be no defaults for these parameters (i.e. results are unlimited. For performance reasons we generally advise LIMITing your query if possible).
You can parameterise your SPARQL by including %{tokens} in your queries, and providing values for the tokens in the request parameters.
Note that the following tokens are reserved and cannot be used as parameters for substitution:
controlleractionpageper_pageidcommitutf8queryOur servers are configured to allow access from all domains. This means that if you’re writing JavaScript to request data from our server in to a web page hosted on another domain, your browser should check this header and allow it.
If you need to support very old browsers, you can additionally pass a callback parameter and the results will be wrapped in that function. For example:
http://statistics.gov.scot/sparql.json?callback=myCallbackFunction&query=SELECT+%2A+WHERE+%7B%3Fs+%3Fp+%3Fo%7D+LIMIT+10This help topic on the jQuery website has more details.
Here’s a couple of examples running a query using the widely available cURL command line program.
Request the results as XML, using a POST:
curl -X POST -H "Accept: application/sparql-results+xml" -d "query=SELECT%20*%20WHERE%20%7B%3Fs%20%3Fp%20%3Fo%7D%20LIMIT%2010" http://statistics.gov.scot/sparqlRequest the results as JSON, using a GET:
curl -X GET -H "Accept: application/sparql-results+json" http://statistics.gov.scot/sparql?query=SELECT%20*%20WHERE%20%7B%3Fs%20%3Fp%20%3Fo%7D%20LIMIT%2010This example HTML page uses jQuery to issue a POST to our SPARQL endpoint, requesting the results as JSON.
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang='en'>
<head>
<script src='http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.9.1.min.js'></script>
</head>
<body>
<script type='text/javascript'>
var query = 'SELECT * WHERE {?s ?p ?o} LIMIT 10';
var url = 'http://statistics.gov.scot/sparql.json';
$.ajax({
method: 'POST',
dataType: 'json',
url: url,
data: {query: query},
success: function(data) {
alert('success: ' + data.results.bindings.length + ' results');
console.log(data);
}
});
</script>
</body>
</html>