---
layout: post
status: publish
published: true
title: Mendeley Android client; first preview and OAuth problem
wordpress_id: 490
wordpress_url: http://www.martineve.com/?p=490
date: !binary |-
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categories:
- Technology
- Android
- Academia
tags:
- Android
- Mendeley
- mendroid
comments:
- id: 5986
author: Mr. Gunn
author_email: william.gunn@mendeley.com
author_url: ''
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content: Hi Martin! Glad to see you're taking a crack at this. You might want to
check the mendeley mailing list on google groups for more help on this, but I've
passed your message along as well
- id: 5989
author: Jason Hoyt
author_email: jason.hoyt@mendeley.com
author_url: http://mendeley.com/about-us/
date: !binary |-
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content: ! "Callbacks are supported with the \"jsonp=YourFunctionName\" argument
at the end of any method.\r\n\r\nCheers!"
- id: 5991
author: Martin Paul Eve
author_email: martin@martineve.com
author_url: ''
date: !binary |-
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content: ! "Thanks to you both; appreciate the feedback and will check the Google
Groups. In the meantime, if the API team get a chance to look and respond while
I'm away, I'll continue work when back after Xmas.\r\n\r\nCheers! (and happy holidays!)"
- id: 6001
author: Ian Mulvany
author_email: ian.mulvany@mendeley.com
author_url: http://www.mendeley.com/profiles/ian-mulvany/
date: !binary |-
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content: ! "There are plenty of people in the Mendeley office with andriod phones
that would love to see this! \r\n\r\nBTW, I love Gravity's Rainbow, and am rather
a fan of Beckett too, so it's really nice to see someone who is bridging the divide
between the literary and digital."
- id: 6002
author: Martin Paul Eve
author_email: martin@martineve.com
author_url: ''
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content: Thanks Ian - looking forward to working on this in the new year - any news
from the API team?
- id: 6050
author: Clemens
author_email: clemens.lombriser@gmail.com
author_url: ''
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content: ! "I also just started a small Android using the signpost library to log
into Mendely. Currently it just reads out my collections and displays them into
a ListActivity. The code is available here:\r\nhttps://code.google.com/p/droidbiblio"
- id: 6051
author: Martin Paul Eve
author_email: martin@martineve.com
author_url: ''
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content: ! "Hi Clemens,\r\n\r\nMany thanks for this; sounds good -- I'll give Signpost
a shot and report back!"
---
<p>In the last day before I head off for a bit of a Christmas break, I decided to take up a recent proposition to start work on an Android client for Mendeley. So far, in a couple of hours, I've got as far as implementing the OAuth provider, so you can start the application, log in to Mendeley and it will ask you to authorize the application to access your Mendeley account.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.martineve.com/2010/12/20/mendeley-android-client-first-preview-and-oauth-problem/mendroid-first-problem/" rel="attachment wp-att-491"><img src="http://www.martineve.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/mendroid-first-problem.png" alt="Mendroid screenshot" title="Mendroid" width="327" height="484" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-491" /></a></p>
<p>Well, that's the theory... there's a problem, though. Currently the OAuth system will <strong>not</strong> work with the Android browser. I took the same URL and request token, accessing the auth URL in one instance with a desktop client and one instance with an android phone (tried on device -- HTC Wildfire -- and emulator). The desktop PC can get an access code, the Android device cannot.</p>
<p><object width="480" height="385"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/KJshIJOdf5Y?fs=1&hl=en_GB&color1=0x5d1719&color2=0xcd311b"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/v/KJshIJOdf5Y?fs=1&hl=en_GB&color1=0x5d1719&color2=0xcd311b" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="480" height="385"></embed></object></p>
<p>Apologies for the quality of that YouTube video, but it does demonstrate the point. As an additional debug procedure, I also ran the working desktop URL to the phone via Chrome to Phone. Same result.</p>
<p>Is Mendeley's API doing something strange based on user agent? Also: does Mendeley's API support a callback URL? (this is kinda crucial for an Android app!)</p>
<p>To try and get some feedback, here's the code it's running for login at present. This code is GPL v3 licensed and I have removed my own keys.</p>
{% highlight java %}
/*
mendroid: An Android Mendeley client
Copyright 2010 Martin Paul Eve
This file is part of Mendroid.
Mendroid is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
(at your option) any later version.
Mendroid is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
GNU General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
along with Mendroid. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
*/
package com.martineve.mendroid;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.net.URISyntaxException;
import java.util.ArrayList;
import java.util.Map;
import net.oauth.OAuth;
import net.oauth.OAuthAccessor;
import net.oauth.OAuthConsumer;
import net.oauth.OAuthException;
import net.oauth.OAuthMessage;
import net.oauth.OAuthServiceProvider;
import net.oauth.client.OAuthClient;
import net.oauth.client.httpclient4.HttpClient4;
import android.app.Activity;
import android.app.ProgressDialog;
import android.content.Intent;
import android.net.Uri;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.text.Html;
import android.text.method.LinkMovementMethod;
import android.view.View;
import android.view.View.OnClickListener;
import android.widget.Button;
import android.widget.TextView;
public class MendeleyDroidLogin extends Activity implements OnClickListener {
OAuthAccessor client;
String access_token;
String request_token;
/** Called when the activity is first created. */
@Override
public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
setContentView(R.layout.main);
Button login_button = (Button) findViewById(R.id.login_button);
login_button.setOnClickListener(this);
// setup the link in the credits box ;)
TextView credits = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.login_page_credits);
credits.setText(Html.fromHtml("Copyright <a href=\"http://www.martineve.com\">Martin Paul Eve</a>, 2011"));
credits.setMovementMethod(LinkMovementMethod.getInstance());
}
protected void onResume() {
// extract the OAUTH access token if it exists
Uri uri = this.getIntent().getData();
if(uri != null) {
ProgressDialog dialog = ProgressDialog.show(this, "",
"Logging in to Mendeley, please wait...", true);
access_token = uri.getQueryParameter("oauth_token");
access_token = convertToAccessToken(client.requestToken);
// setDefaultAccessToken(access_token, this); // keep this in the database
dialog.cancel();
}
super.onResume();
}
public String convertToAccessToken(String request_token) {
ArrayList<Map.Entry<String, String>> params = new ArrayList<Map.Entry<String, String>>();
OAuthClient oclient = new OAuthClient(new HttpClient4());
OAuthAccessor accessor = client;
params.add(new OAuth.Parameter("oauth_token", request_token));
try {
OAuthMessage omessage = oclient.invoke(accessor, "POST", accessor.consumer.serviceProvider.accessTokenURL, params);
return omessage.getParameter("oauth_token");
} catch (Exception ioe) {
return "";
}
}
public void onClick(View v) {
// get the request token
ProgressDialog dialog = ProgressDialog.show(this, "",
"Communicating with Mendeley, please wait...", true);
client = defaultClient();
dialog.cancel();
Intent i = new Intent(Intent.ACTION_VIEW);
i.setData(Uri.parse(client.consumer.serviceProvider.userAuthorizationURL +
"?oauth_token=" + client.requestToken +
"&oauth_callback=" + client.consumer.callbackURL));
startActivity(i);
}
OAuthServiceProvider defaultProvider() {
return new OAuthServiceProvider("http://www.mendeley.com/oauth/request_token/", "http://www.mendeley.com/oauth/authorize/", "http://www.mendeley.com/oauth/access_token/");
}
OAuthAccessor defaultClient() {
String callbackUrl = "martineve-mendroid:///";
OAuthServiceProvider provider = defaultProvider();
String consumerKey = "CONSUMER_KEY_HERE";
String consumerSecret = "CONSUMER_SECRET_HERE";
OAuthConsumer consumer = new OAuthConsumer(callbackUrl, consumerKey,
consumerSecret, provider);
OAuthAccessor accessor = new OAuthAccessor(consumer);
OAuthClient oaclient = new OAuthClient(new HttpClient4());
try {
oaclient.getRequestToken(accessor);
request_token = accessor.requestToken;
} catch (IOException e) {
// TODO Auto-generated catch block
e.printStackTrace();
} catch (OAuthException e) {
// TODO Auto-generated catch block
e.printStackTrace();
} catch (URISyntaxException e) {
// TODO Auto-generated catch block
e.printStackTrace();
}
return accessor;
}
}
{% endhighlight %}
<p>For now, I'm off on holiday, but if anyone had any thoughts, I'd love to hear them. Merry Christmas all!</p>