Message

• Fields
• Message Annotations
• Machine only Messages
• General Parameters

A Message is very similar to a Post but 1) it doesn’t have to be public and 2) it will be delivered to an arbitrary set of users (not just the users who follow the Message creator). For an overview of the App.net messaging API, please see the Introduction to App.net Messaging.

{
  "channel_id": "1",
  "created_at": "2012-12-11T00:31:49Z",
  "entities": {
    "hashtags": [

    ],
    "links": [

    ],
    "mentions": [

    ]
  },
  "html": "<span itemscope=\"https://app.net/schemas/Post\">Hello channel!</span>",
  "id": "1",
  "machine_only": false,
  "num_replies": 0,
  "source": {
    "client_id": "UxUWrSdVLyCaShN62xZR5tknGvAxK93P",
    "link": "https://app.net",
    "name": "Test app"
  },
  "text": "Hello channel!",
  "thread_id": "1",
  "user": "...user object..."
}

Fields

Field	Type	Description
id	string	Primary identifier for a Message. This will be an integer, but it is always expressed as a string to avoid limitations with the way JavaScript integers are expressed.
channel_id	string	The id of the Channel this Message belongs to. This will be an integer, but it is always expressed as a string to avoid limitations with the way JavaScript integers are expressed.
user	object	This is an embedded version of the User object. In certain cases (e.g., when a user account has been deleted), this key may be omitted.
created_at	string	The time at which the Message was create in ISO 8601 format.
text	string	User supplied text of the Message. All Unicode characters allowed. Maximum length 2048 characters. The maximum length can be retrieved from the Configuration endpoint.
html	string	Server-generated annotated HTML rendering of Message text.
source	object	Field Type Description name string Description of the API consumer that created this Message. link string Link provided by the API consumer that created this Message.
reply_to	string	The id of the Message this Message is replying to (or null if not a reply).
thread_id	string	The id of the post at the root of the thread that this Message is a part of. If thread_id==id then this property does not guarantee that the thread has > 1 Message. Please see num_replies.
num_replies	integer	The number of messages created in reply to this Message.
annotations	list	Metadata about the entire Message. See the Annotations documentation.
entities	object	Rich text information for this message. See the Entities documentation.
is_deleted	boolean	Has this message been deleted? For non-deleted Messages, this key may be omitted instead of being false. If a Message has been deleted, the text, html, and entities properties will be empty and may be omitted.
machine_only	boolean	Is this Message meant for humans or other apps? See machine only Messages for more information.

Message Annotations

Message annotations are immutable attributes that describe the entire message. Please see the Annotations documentation for more information.

Machine only Messages

Sometimes a Message is not meant for human consumption but it may be readable by an App of some kind. In that case, you can create a machine only Message by including annotations, omitting text, and setting machine_only: true. You can request machine only Messages using the include_machine=1 query string parameter.

General Parameters

Where noted, Message endpoints respond to the following query string parameters:

Name	Required?	Type	Description
include_muted	Optional	integer (0 or 1)	Should Messages from muted Users be included? Defaults to false except when you specifically request a Message from a muted User.
include_deleted	Optional	integer (0 or 1)	Should deleted Messages be included? Defaults to true.
include_machine	Optional	integer (0 or 1)	Should machine only Messages be included? Defaults to false.
include_annotations	Optional	integer (0 or 1)	Should annotations be included in the response objects? Defaults to false.
include_message_annotations	Optional	integer (0 or 1)	Should Message annotations be included in the response objects? Defaults to false.
include_user_annotations	Optional	integer (0 or 1)	Should User annotations be included in the response objects? Defaults to false.
include_html	Optional	integer (0 or 1)	Should the html field be included alongside the text field in the response objects? Defaults to true.

Where noted, endpoints that return a stream of Messages additionally respond to pagination parameters.