Amazon anounced Amazon E-Commerce Service (ECS) together with Alexa Web Information Service (AWIS).
AWIS interests me a lot since it is quite close to the Google WEB APIs used by g-metrics.com. So, I had a look at it.
AWIS vs. Google Web APIs
First of all, AWIS seems to provide much more features than the Google Web APIs. It has 5 modes (URL Information, Browse Category, Web Search, Crawl Meta Data and Web Map) [dtls.] that allows for more flexibility (ex. links in-out, usage/traffic stats, etc.).
One more nice thing is that you have the freedom to choose between SOAP and REST to acces the services, while Google only allows for SOAP (which I prefer, but this is another thing).
Finally, by getting “a developer’s key” you are entitled for 10,000 queries/day (Google gives 1,000).
On the other hand: AWIS SOAP does not work out-of-the-box since there seems to be a problem with the wsdl file. In addition, there does not seem to be a way to make complex queries (while Google Web APIs allows a query to have “AND’, ‘OR’, “inurl:”, “allintext:”, “allinlinks:”, “site:”, etc.)
Conclusion
If for one thing, it get is becoming clear that we are going towards a Web of Services. More and more websites are turning into “web services providers”, transforming the net to a real Application Platform… I am not to say if AWIS is better than Google Web APIs, especially considering that they are both in Beta.
What’s more, Alexa.com declares to be “powered by Google”!?? (have a look at www.alexa.com). If we are talking about the same underlying database, then developers just have two alternative ways to access it -and THAT is really interesting!!!.
I will definitely add AWIS support to g-metrics.com, so stay tuned.
I didn’t know that alexa had a connection with google…
To clarify, the Alexa web site offers a Google search. But the AWIS service is a new search index, built by Alexa not Google. The index contains over 4.5 Billion pages, which is, I think, the largest search index available.
AWIS search also allows up to 1000 results per query. You won’t be able to get that anywhere else. And it is supposed to support all of the Google AND, OR, allintext etc, and more. In fact, here’s one that rocks, and is undocumented. Type in dmoz: followed by a dmoz category in quotes, and results will be restricted to sites appearing in that branch of the DMOZ tree. Imagine this. You want to create a local search engine for Concord New Hampshire. Easy. Just insert dmoz:”Regional/North America/United States/New Hampshire/Localities/C/Concord” into the search string, and you have it. Localized search in one step. Or, create a linux oriented search with dmoz:linux (the whole path is not required. Alexa will limit the search to all sites in all categories that have the word “linux”.
The whole thing is still in beta, so expect some bugs. But there is a lot of promise in here and much more to come.
Great info, thanks Geoff!
I implemented this API and found that I have to make a request on the same search term two or three times to get a result returned. Have you noticed this or know of a work around?