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So I am looking at http://mathoverflow.net, trying to blow some cobwebs out of the dark corners of my brain that used to house some not-insignificant abilities and found myself wondering about API access.

I realize that this and other sites are not owned or operated by SO so what is the process?

Is the API to be offered as a value-add to hosted sites or perhaps an oss model to externally hosted sites wherein they can install api access and if necessary purchase support? Can the owneres/operatores of a site simply say 'hey, we wants us some api!'?

The reason I ask is that when we start considering the niche areas covered by some of these sites, interesting and marketable app ideas start to flow making my entrepreneurial bits all warm and tingly not to mention lending potential real value to all of the hours I have spend building infrastructure to leverage the api.

Summary

Kevin has made it clear that the 1.0 api will not be offered by pre 2.0 SE sites.

In the question, mathoverflow is simply offered as the impetus for the question. The implication that I am referring to API v1 is understandable but not accurate.

Let me summarize the question:

To help api app developers cognificate on possible future api apps and take steps to develop ideas, do market research and establish precedence, answers to the following questions would be appreciated, if the information is available:

  • can it to be expected that the API, version 2.0, will be exposed by SE 2.0 sites?
  • if so, is the API something that is going to be baked in by default or will it be subject to opt-in and or access control by each particular site owner/operator?
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There are no plans for the API to be back ported to SE 1.0 sites at this time. That code base has diverged non-trivially from the SO mainline.

SE 2.0 sites will get the API.

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  • ok. that is interesting and understandable, buy my question, as it is, has much relevance and interest to api developers and is unanswered.
    – Sky Sanders
    Commented Jun 27, 2010 at 17:58
  • @code poet - uhm, the API won't be offered on SE 1.0 sites like mathoverflow.net, unless they come to SE 2.0. That's pretty cut and dry. I suppose there's nothing preventing them from implementing it themselves, they do own the data after all; but I've seen nothing to indicate any SE 1.0 sites plan to do so.
    – Kevin Montrose
    Commented Jun 27, 2010 at 18:32
  • i have clarified the question.
    – Sky Sanders
    Commented Jun 27, 2010 at 18:47
  • Will the SE 2.0 sites show up on StackAuth?
    – Nathan Osman
    Commented Jun 27, 2010 at 19:05

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