+-------+ | Twurl | +-------+ Twurl is like curl, but tailored specifically for the Twitter API. It knows how to grant an access token to a client application for a specified user and then sign all requests with that access token. It also provides other development and debugging conveniences such as defining aliases for common requests, as well as support for multiple access tokens to easily switch between different client applications and Twitter accounts. +-----------------+ | Getting Started | +-----------------+ The first thing you have to do is register an OAuth application to get a consumer key and secret. http://dev.twitter.com/apps/new When you have your consumer key and its secret you authorize your Twitter account to make API requests with your consumer key and secret. % twurl authorize --consumer-key key \ --consumer-secret secret This will return an URL that you should open up in your browser. Authenticate to Twitter, and then enter the returned PIN back into the terminal. Assuming all that works well, you will beauthorized to make requests with the API. Twurl will tell you as much. If your consumer application has xAuth enabled, then you can use a variant of the above % twurl authorize -u username -p password \ --consumer-key key \ --consumer-secret secret And, again assuming your username, password, key and secret is correct, will authorize you in one step. +-----------------+ | Making Requests | +-----------------+ The simplest request just requires that you specify the path you want to request. % twurl /1.1/statuses/home_timeline.json Similar to curl, a GET request is performed by default. You can implicitly perform a POST request by passing the -d option, which specifies POST parameters. % twurl -d 'status=Testing twurl' /1.1/statuses/update.json You can explicitly specify what request method to perform with the -X (or --request-method) option. % twurl -X POST /1.1/statuses/destroy/1234567890.json +------------------+ | Creating aliases | +------------------+ % twurl alias h /1.1/statuses/home_timeline.json You can then use "h" in place of the full path. % twurl h Paths that require additional options such as request parameters for example can be used with aliases the same as with full explicit paths, just as you might expect. % twurl alias tweet /1.1/statuses/update.json % twurl tweet -d "status=Aliases in twurl are convenient" +-------------------------------+ | Changing your default profile | +-------------------------------+ The first time you authorize a client application to make requests on behalf of your account, twurl stores your access token information in its .twurlrc file. Subsequent requests will use this profile as the default profile. You can use the 'accounts' subcommand to see what client applications have been authorized for what user names: % twurl accounts noradio HQsAGcBm5MQT4n6j7qVJw hhC7Koy2zRsTZvQh1hVlSA (default) testiverse guT9RsJbNQgVe6AwoY9BA Notice that one of those consumer keys is marked as the default. To change the default use the 'set' subcommand, passing then either just the username, if it's unambiguous, or the username and consumer key pair if it isn't unambiguous: % twurl set default testiverse % twurl accounts noradio HQsAGcBm5MQT4n6j7qVJw hhC7Koy2zRsTZvQh1hVlSA testiverse guT9RsJbNQgVe6AwoY9BA (default) % twurl set default noradio HQsAGcBm5MQT4n6j7qVJw % twurl accounts noradio HQsAGcBm5MQT4n6j7qVJw (default) hhC7Koy2zRsTZvQh1hVlSA testiverse guT9RsJbNQgVe6AwoY9BA +--------------+ | Contributors | +--------------+ Marcel Molina <marcel@twitter.com> / @noradio Erik Michaels-Ober / @sferik