Catalog API Create Course with Listing Image

Question

I am trying to create a Catalog entry though the API call. It created successfully but there is no Listing image.

Documentation says: course[listing_image] : URL or file upload for the image to be shown with this listing : String.

I'm trying to use URL and verified it is definitely valid and accessible.

Alternatively, what do they mean by "file upload"?

Any ideas or suggestions? Here is my JSON:

{
    "title": "My test course",
    "description": "My test course- long description here",
    "listing_path": "2020-21-myTestCourse",
"listing_image": "http://myfavoritehosting.edu/mywebapp/catalogimage.jpg",
    "teaser": "It's gonna be great!",
    "account_id": 9486,
    "catalog": {
        "id": 9486
    },
    "canvas_course": {
        "id": 1566
    },
    "visibility": "listed",
    "enrollment_open": true
}

Thank you!

makraft · Answer

SOLVED: I am not a coder, but I did figure this out, so I thought I would share in case someone stumbles across this old post.

The solution is that your Catalog listing data must be enclosed in a "course" container in your code, and there are some requirements around the image as well. Image Requirements:

* HTTPS URL (this is an assumption since my http url resulted in an error)
* URL ends with the image file extension (.jpg, .png) 
* URL is publicly available. 
* Image Size: Instructure support advised me that the image size for a course listing image is 1050 x 768px. I think you can be a little liberal with this, but how it fits in the listing image container could be affected (just as if you had uploaded it by hand).

This is a working API URL constructed and submitted with Postman (assumes authorization key is properly configured for Canvas API and you're using your own Catalog info) for a subcatalog with the account_ID 9999, a Canvas Course with ID 0001, course name, teaser, description, path, visibility, and listing_image as a URL

https://your-catalog-instance.instructure.com/api/v1/courses/?course[account_id]=9999&course[canvas_course_id]=0001&course[title]=API  Course 1&course[description]=This is a description&course[teaser]=this is a teaser&course[path]=api-course-1&course[visibility]=listed&course[listing_image]=https://somesite.com/image.png

In my Ruby script (Mac), which pulls the data from a CSV file, it looks something like this when creating the listing - note the course container:

course:{
      canvas_course_id: course_id,
      title: listing_title,
      path: listing_path,
      teaser: listing_teaser,
      description: listing_description,
      visibility: listing_visibility,
      account_id: subaccount_id,
      listing_image: catalog_image
    }

Final thoughts:
In my case my images are actually publicly accessible on the web, so the URL method works great for me. Consequently, I did not attempt a file upload from my computer.

In case you need to do this as an upload, this is what instructure shared with me about this workflow with a file upload, using cURL in their example:

curl -i 'https://instance.catalog.instructure.com/api/v1/courses' \
-X POST -H "Authorization: Bearer insert_token_here" \
-F 'course[title]=title_here' \
-F 'course[description]=description' \
-F 'course[path]=unique-path-here' \
-F 'course[teaser]=teaser' \
-F 'course[canvas_course_id]=course_id_here' \
-F 'course[listing_image]=@image_file.png'

If you are using an SVG image you also need to include the type with course[listing_image] added with something like:

-F 'course[listing_image]=@image_file.svg;type=image/svg+xml'

Cheers!
Melinda

bbennett2 · Answer

Our district doesn't use the catalog, but are you getting any errors back in the response when you create the course? Or, if you inspect the element in the browser once it's created, do you see any errors in the HTML or CSS?

As far as a file upload, there's a File Upload endpoint and workflow that allows you send items directly to Canvas instead of using a URL reference. If using a URL reference doesn't work, it might be worth trying the upload step as part of the debugging.

alexei-bezpaltc · Answer

Bump. Anybody here?

Any help from Instructure developers? From Thoma Bravo?