Quickstart: Perform a news search using Java and Bing News Search REST API
Use this quickstart to make your first call to Bing News Search API. This simple Java application sends a news search query to the API, and displays the JSON response.
Although this application is written in Java, the API is a RESTful Web service compatible with most programming languages.
The source code for this sample is available on GitHub.
Prerequisites
Create and initialize a project
Create a new Java project in your favorite IDE or editor, and import the following libraries:
import java.net.*; import java.util.*; import java.io.*; import javax.net.ssl.HttpsURLConnection; import com.google.gson.Gson; import com.google.gson.GsonBuilder; import com.google.gson.JsonObject; import com.google.gson.JsonParser;Create a new class. Add variables for the API endpoint, your subscription key, and search term.
public static SearchResults SearchNews (String searchQuery) throws Exception { static String subscriptionKey = "enter key here"; static String host = "https://api.bing.microsoft.com"; static String path = "/v7.0/news/search"; static String searchTerm = "Microsoft"; //... }
Construct the search request, and receive a JSON response
Use the variables from the previous step to format a search URL for the API request. URL-encode your search term before you append it to the request.
public static SearchResults SearchNews (String searchQuery) throws Exception { // construct the search request URL (in the form of URL + query string) URL url = new URL(host + path + "?q=" + URLEncoder.encode(searchQuery, "UTF-8")); HttpsURLConnection connection = (HttpsURLConnection)url.openConnection(); connection.setRequestProperty("Ocp-Apim-Subscription-Key", subscriptionKey); }Receive the JSON response from the Bing News Search API and construct the result object.
// receive JSON body InputStream stream = connection.getInputStream(); String response = new Scanner(stream).useDelimiter("\\A").next(); // construct result object for return SearchResults results = new SearchResults(new HashMap<String, String>(), response);
Process the JSON response
Separate the Bing-related HTTP headers from the JSON body, then close the stream and return the API response.
// extract Bing-related HTTP headers Map<String, List<String>> headers = connection.getHeaderFields(); for (String header : headers.keySet()) { if (header == null) continue; // may have null key if (header.startsWith("BingAPIs-") || header.startsWith("X-MSEdge-")) { results.relevantHeaders.put(header, headers.get(header).get(0)); } } stream.close(); return results;Create a method to parse and reserialize the JSON results.
// pretty-printer for JSON; uses GSON parser to parse and re-serialize public static String prettify(String json_text) { JsonParser parser = new JsonParser(); JsonObject json = parser.parse(json_text).getAsJsonObject(); Gson gson = new GsonBuilder().setPrettyPrinting().create(); return gson.toJson(json); }In the main method of your application, call the search method and display the results.
public static void main (String[] args) { System.out.println("Searching the Web for: " + searchTerm); SearchResults result = SearchNews(searchTerm); System.out.println("\nRelevant HTTP Headers:\n"); for (String header : result.relevantHeaders.keySet()) System.out.println(header + ": " + result.relevantHeaders.get(header)); System.out.println("\nJSON Response:\n"); System.out.println(prettify(result.jsonResponse)); }
Example JSON response
A successful response is returned in JSON, as shown in the following example:
{
"_type": "News",
"readLink": "https:\/\/api.cognitive.microsoft.com\/api\/v7\/news\/search?q=Microsoft",
"totalEstimatedMatches": 36,
"sort": [
{
"name": "Best match",
"id": "relevance",
"isSelected": true,
"url": "https:\/\/api.cognitive.microsoft.com\/api\/v7\/news\/search?q=Microsoft"
},
{
"name": "Most recent",
"id": "date",
"isSelected": false,
"url": "https:\/\/api.cognitive.microsoft.com\/api\/v7\/news\/search?q=Microsoft&sortby=date"
}
],
"value": [
{
"name": "Microsoft to open flagship London brick-and-mortar retail store",
"url": "http:\/\/www.contoso.com\/article\/microsoft-to-open-flagshi...",
"image": {
"thumbnail": {
"contentUrl": "https:\/\/www.bing.com\/th?id=ON.F9E4A49EC010417...",
"width": 220,
"height": 146
}
},
"description": "After years of rumors about Microsoft opening a brick-and-mortar...",
"about": [
{
"readLink": "https:\/\/api.cognitive.microsoft.com\/api\/v7\/entiti...",
"name": "Microsoft"
},
{
"readLink": "https:\/\/api.cognitive.microsoft.com\/api\/v7\/entit...",
"name": "London"
}
],
"provider": [
{
"_type": "Organization",
"name": "Contoso"
}
],
"datePublished": "2017-09-21T21:16:00.0000000Z",
"category": "ScienceAndTechnology"
},
. . .
{
"name": "Microsoft adds Availability Zones to its Azure cloud platform",
"url": "https:\/\/contoso.com\/2017\/09\/21\/microsoft-adds-availability...",
"image": {
"thumbnail": {
"contentUrl": "https:\/\/www.bing.com\/th?id=ON.0AE7595B9720...",
"width": 700,
"height": 466
}
},
"description": "Microsoft has begun adding Availability Zones to its...",
"about": [
{
"readLink": "https:\/\/api.cognitive.microsoft.com\/api\/v7\/entities\/a093e9b...",
"name": "Microsoft"
},
{
"readLink": "https:\/\/api.cognitive.microsoft.com\/api\/v7\/entities\/cf3abf7d-e379-...",
"name": "Windows Azure"
},
{
"readLink": "https:\/\/api.cognitive.microsoft.com\/api\/v7\/entities\/9cdd061c-1fae-d0...",
"name": "Cloud"
}
],
"provider": [
{
"_type": "Organization",
"name": "Contoso"
}
],
"datePublished": "2017-09-21T09:01:00.0000000Z",
"category": "ScienceAndTechnology"
}
]
}