File access

Getting started

Audience

This article is intended for web developers who have already set up the Filmchief REST API and who need to access to files in a Filmchief database. It is recommended to familiarize yourself with Filmchief from a user's point of view.

Prerequisites

To access files, all you need is a working Filmchief REST API connection.

Basic file access

To access public files, just request https://«FESTIVAL IDENTIFIER».filmchief.com/f/«filename», where «filename» is the name value of a file that you get from the API.

Protected files

Certain files are not intended for publication, therefore they are not accessible using the above method. You can recognize these files by their name, which starts with /files/.protected/.

To retrieve a protected file, you must add an auth parameter to the URL, which can be constructed as follows:

1. Create a string by concatenating «FESTIVAL IDENTIFIER» and «FILE DOWNLOAD KEY».
2. The auth parameter value is the MD5 hash of the above string.

For example, to retrieve the protected file /files/.protected/secret.pdf, the URL would be:

https://«FESTIVAL IDENTIFIER».filmchief.com/f/files/.protected/secret.pdf?auth=«AUTH KEY»

Image operations

The server also accepts a format parameter, which provides various options to retrieve a scaled or cropped copy of an image, for example:

• Reduced to max. 480 pixels wide: https://«FESTIVAL IDENTIFIER».filmchief.com/f/«filename»?format=w480
• Reduced to max. 200 pixels tall: https://«FESTIVAL IDENTIFIER».filmchief.com/f/«filename»?format=h200

Combining multiple format options is also possible, for example:

• Covering a minimal rectangle of 300 x 500 and cropped to 300 x 500: https://«FESTIVAL IDENTIFIER».filmchief.com/f/«filename»?format=cvw300cvh500crw300crh500

Here is a list of all possible format options: