Xeroizer API Library

Homepage: http://waynerobinson.github.com/xeroizer Git: git://github.com/waynerobinson/xeroizer.git Github: https://github.com/waynerobinson/xeroizer Author: Wayne Robinson http://www.wayne-robinson.com Contributors: See Contributors section below Copyright: 2007-2013 License: MIT License

Introduction

This library is designed to help ruby/rails based applications communicate with the publicly available API for Xero.

If you are unfamiliar with the Xero API, you should first read the documentation located at http://developer.xero.com.

Installation

gem install xeroizer

Basic Usage

require 'rubygems'
require 'xeroizer'

# Create client (used to communicate with the API).
client = Xeroizer::PublicApplication.new(YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY, YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET)

# Retrieve list of contacts (note: all communication must be made through the client).
contacts = client.Contact.all(:order => 'Name')

Authentication

Xero uses OAuth to authenticate API clients. The OAuth gem (with minor modification) by John Nunemaker (http://github.com/jnunemaker/twitter) is used in this library. If you've used this before, things will all seem very familar.

There are three methods of authentication detailed below:

All: Consumer Key/Secret

All methods of authentication require your OAuth consumer key and secret. This can be found for your application in the API management console at http://api.xero.com.

Public Applications

Public applications use a 3-legged authorisation process. A user will need to authorise your application against each organisation that you want access to. Your application can have access to many organisations at once by going through the authorisation process for each organisation.

The access token received will expire after 30 minutes. If you want access for longer you will need the user to re-authorise your application.

Authentication occurs in 3 steps:

client = Xeroizer::PublicApplication.new(YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY, YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET)

# 1. Get a RequestToken from Xero. :oauth_callback is the URL the user will be redirected to
#    after they have authenticated your application.
#
#    Note: The callback URL's domain must match that listed for your application in http://api.xero.com
#          otherwise the user will not be redirected and only be shown the authentication code.
request_token = client.request_token(:oauth_callback => 'http://yourapp.com/oauth/callback')

# 2. Redirect the user to the URL specified by the RequestToken.
#
#    Note: example uses redirect_to method defined in Rails controllers.
redirect_to request_token.authorize_url

# 3. Exchange RequestToken for AccessToken.
#    This access token will be used for all subsequent requests but it is stored within the client
#    application so you don't have to record it.
#
#    Note: This example assumes the callback URL is a Rails action.
client.authorize_from_request(request_token.token, request_token.secret, :oauth_verifier => params[:oauth_verifier])

You can now use the client to access the Xero API methods, e.g.

contacts = client.Contact.all

Example Rails Controller

class XeroSessionController < ApplicationController

	before_filter :get_xero_client

	public

		def new
			request_token = @xero_client.request_token(:oauth_callback => 'http://yourapp.com/xero_session/create')
			session[:request_token] = request_token.token
			session[:request_secret] = request_token.secret

			redirect_to request_token.authorize_url
		end

		def create
			@xero_client.authorize_from_request(
					session[:request_token],
					session[:request_secret],
					:oauth_verifier => params[:oauth_verifier] )

			session[:xero_auth] = {
					:access_token => @xero_client.access_token.token,
					:access_key => @xero_client.access_token.secret }

			session.data.delete(:request_token)
			session.data.delete(:request_secret)
		end

		def destroy
			session.data.delete(:xero_auth)
		end

	private

		def get_xero_client
			@xero_client = Xeroizer::PublicApplication.new(YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY, YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET)

			# Add AccessToken if authorised previously.
			if session[:xero_auth]
				@xero_client.authorize_from_access(
					session[:xero_auth][:access_token],
					session[:xero_auth][:access_key] )
			end
		end
end

Storing AccessToken

You can store the access token/secret pair so you can access the API again without user intervention. Currently these tokens are only valid for 30 minutes and will raise a Xeroizer::OAuth::TokenExpired exception if you try to access the API beyond the token's expiry time.

If you want API access for longer consider creating a PartnerApplication which will allow you to renew tokens.

access_key = client.access_token.token
access_secret = client.access_token.secret

Private Applications

Private applications use a 2-legged authorisation process. When you register your application, you will select the organisation that is authorised to your application. This cannot be changed afterwards, although you can register another private application if you have multiple organisations.

Note: You can only register organisations you are authorised to yourself.

Private applications require a private RSA keypair which is used to sign each request to the API. You can generate this keypair on Mac OSX or Linux with OpenSSL. For example:

openssl genrsa -out privatekey.pem 1024
openssl req -newkey rsa:1024 -x509 -key privatekey.pem -out publickey.cer -days 365
openssl pkcs12 -export -out public_privatekey.pfx -inkey privatekey.pem -in publickey.cer

You need to upload this public_privatekey.pfx file to your private application in http://api.xero.com.

Example usage:

client = Xeroizer::PrivateApplication.new(YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY, YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET, "/path/to/privatekey.pem")
contacts = client.Contact.all

To provide a private key directly, set the path to nil and pass in a private_key option instead. For example:

# Using environment variables (e.g. Heroku):
client = Xeroizer::PrivateApplication.new(key, secret, nil, private_key: ENV["XERO_PRIVATE_KEY"])

# Using Rails Credentials (Rails 5.2+):
client = Xeroizer::PrivateApplication.new(key, secret, nil, private_key: Rails.application.credentials.xero_private_key)

Partner Applications

Partner applications use a combination of 3-legged authorisation and private key message signing.

Visit the [https://developer.xero.com/partner/app-partner](Becoming an app partner) page to get permission to create a partner application.

After you have followed the instructions provided by Xero for partner applications and uploaded your certificate you can access the partner application in a similar way to public applications.

Authentication occcurs in 3 steps:

client = Xeroizer::PartnerApplication.new(
					YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY,
					YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET,
					"/path/to/privatekey.pem"
					)

# 1. Get a RequestToken from Xero. :oauth_callback is the URL the user will be redirected to
#    after they have authenticated your application.
#
#    Note: The callback URL's domain must match that listed for your application in http://api.xero.com
#          otherwise the user will not be redirected and only be shown the authentication code.
request_token = client.request_token(:oauth_callback => 'http://yourapp.com/oauth/callback')

# 2. Redirect the user to the URL specified by the RequestToken.
#
#    Note: example uses redirect_to method defined in Rails controllers.
redirect_to request_token.authorize_url

# 3. Exchange RequestToken for AccessToken.
#    This access token will be used for all subsequent requests but it is stored within the client
#    application so you don't have to record it.
#
#    Note: This example assumes the callback URL is a Rails action.
client.authorize_from_request(request_token.token, request_token.secret, :oauth_verifier => params[:oauth_verifier])

This AccessToken will last for 30 minutes however, when using the partner application API you can renew this token. To be able to renew this token, you need to save the following data from this organisation's AccessToken:

session_handle = client.session_handle
access_key = client.access_token.token
access_secret = client.access_token.secret

Two other interesting attributes of the PartnerApplication client are:

#expires_at: Time this AccessToken will expire (usually 30 minutes into the future). #authorization_expires_at: How long this organisation has authorised you to access their data (usually 10 years into the future).

AccessToken Renewal

Renewal of an access token requires knowledge of the previous access token generated for this organisation. To renew:

# If you still have a client instance.
client.renew_access_token

# If you are renewing from stored token/session details.
client.renew_access_token(access_token, access_secret, session_handle)

This will invalidate the previous token and refresh the access_key and access_secret as specified in the initial authorisation process. You must always know the previous token's details to renew access to this session.

If you lose these details at any stage you can always reauthorise by redirecting the user back to the Xero OAuth gateway.

Branding Themes API

Once you are approved as a Xero Partner you can request unofficial documentation to do with customizing Payment Services and Branding Themes using the API. There is more info on that here.

Retrieving Data

Each of the below record types is implemented within this library. To allow for multiple access tokens to be used at the same time in a single application, the model classes are accessed from the instance of PublicApplication, PrivateApplication or PartnerApplication. All class-level operations occur on this singleton. For example:

xero = Xeroizer::PublicApplication.new(YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY, YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET)
xero.authorize_from_access(session[:xero_auth][:access_token], session[:xero_auth][:access_key])

contacts = xero.Contact.all(:order => 'Name')

new_contact = xero.Contact.build(:name => 'ABC Development')
saved = new_contact.save

#all([options])

Retrieves list of all records with matching options.

Note: Some records (Invoice, CreditNote) only return summary information for the contact and no line items when returning them this list operation. This library takes care of automatically retrieving the contact and line items from Xero on first access however, this first access has a large performance penalty and will count as an extra query towards your 5,000/day and 60/minute request per organisation limit.

Valid options are:

:modified_since

Records modified after this Time (must be specified in UTC).

:order

Field to order by. Should be formatted as Xero-based field (e.g. 'Name', 'ContactID', etc)

:status

Status field for PurchaseOrder. Should be a valid Xero purchase order status.

:date_from

DateFrom field for PurchaseOrder. Should be in YYYY-MM-DD format.

:date_to

DateTo field for PurchaseOrder. Should be in YYYY-MM-DD format.

:where

See Where Filters section below.

#first([options])

This is a shortcut method for all and actually runs all however, this method only returns the first entry returned by all and never an array.

#find(id)

Looks up a single record matching id. This ID can either be the internal GUID Xero uses for the record or, in the case of Invoice, CreditNote and Contact records, your own custom reference number used when creating these records.

Where filters

Hash

You can specify find filters by providing the :where option with a hash. For example:

invoices = Xero.Invoice.all(:where => {:type => 'ACCREC', :amount_due_is_not => 0})

will automatically create the Xero string:

Type=="ACCREC"&&AmountDue<>0

The default method for filtering is the equality '==' operator however, these can be overridden by modifying the postfix of the attribute name (as you can see for the :amount_due field above).

\{attribute_name}_is_not will use '<>'
\{attribute_name}_is_greater_than will use '>'
\{attribute_name}_is_greater_than_or_equal_to will use '>='
\{attribute_name}_is_less_than will use '<'
\{attribute_name}_is_less_than_or_equal_to will use '<='

The default is '=='

Note: Currently, the hash-conversion library only allows for AND-based criteria and doesn't take into account associations. For these, please use the custom filter method below.

Custom Xero-formatted string

Xero allows advanced custom filters to be added to a request. The where parameter can reference any XML element in the resulting response, including all nested XML elements.

Example 1: Retrieve all invoices for a specific contact ID:

	invoices = xero.Invoice.all(:where => 'Contact.ContactID.ToString()=="cd09aa49-134d-40fb-a52b-b63c6a91d712"')

Example 2: Retrieve all unpaid ACCREC Invoices against a particular Contact Name:

	invoices = xero.Invoice.all(:where => 'Contact.Name=="Basket Case" && Type=="ACCREC" && AmountDue<>0')

Example 3: Retrieve all Invoices PAID between certain dates

	invoices = xero.Invoice.all(:where => 'FullyPaidOnDate>=DateTime.Parse("2010-01-01T00:00:00")&&FullyPaidOnDate<=DateTime.Parse("2010-01-08T00:00:00")')

Example 4: Retrieve all Invoices using Paging (batches of 100)

	invoices = xero.Invoice.find_in_batches({page_number: 1}) do |invoice_batch|
	  invoice_batch.each do |invoice|
	    ...
	  end
	end

Example 5: Retrieve all Bank Accounts:

	accounts = xero.Account.all(:where => 'Type=="BANK"')

Example 6: Retrieve all DELETED or VOIDED Invoices:

	invoices = xero.Invoice.all(:where => 'Status=="VOIDED" OR Status=="DELETED"')

Example 7: Retrieve all contacts with specific text in the contact name:

	contacts = xero.Contact.all(:where => 'Name.Contains("Peter")')
	contacts = xero.Contact.all(:where => 'Name.StartsWith("Pet")')
	contacts = xero.Contact.all(:where => 'Name.EndsWith("er")')

Associations

Records may be associated with each other via two different methods, has_many and belongs_to.

has_many example:

invoice = xero.Invoice.find('cd09aa49-134d-40fb-a52b-b63c6a91d712')
invoice.line_items.each do | line_item |
	puts "Line Description: #{line_item.description}"
end

belongs_to example:

invoice = xero.Invoice.find('cd09aa49-134d-40fb-a52b-b63c6a91d712')
puts "Invoice Contact Name: #{invoice.contact.name}"

Attachments

Files or raw data can be attached to record types attach_data examples:

invoice = xero.Invoice.find('cd09aa49-134d-40fb-a52b-b63c6a91d712')
invoice.attach_data("example.txt", "This is raw data", "txt")

attach_data('cd09aa49-134d-40fb-a52b-b63c6a91d712', "example.txt", "This is raw data", "txt")

attach_file examples:

invoice = xero.Invoice.find('cd09aa49-134d-40fb-a52b-b63c6a91d712')
invoice.attach_file("example.png", "/path/to/image.png", "image/png")

attach_file('cd09aa49-134d-40fb-a52b-b63c6a91d712', "example.png", "/path/to/image.png", "image/png")

include with online invoice To include an attachment with an invoice set include_online parameter to true within the options hash

invoice = xero.Invoice.find('cd09aa49-134d-40fb-a52b-b63c6a91d712')
invoice.attach_file("example.png", "/path/to/image.png", "image/png", { include_online: true })

Creating/Updating Data

Creating

New records can be created like:

contact = xero.Contact.build(:name => 'Contact Name')
contact.first_name = 'Joe'
contact.last_name = 'Bloggs'
contact.add_address(:type => 'STREET', :line1 => '12 Testing Lane', :city => 'Brisbane')
contact.add_phone(:type => 'DEFAULT', :area_code => '07', :number => '3033 1234')
contact.add_phone(:type => 'MOBILE', :number => '0412 123 456')
contact.save

To add to a has_many association use the add_{association} method. For example:

contact.add_address(:type => 'STREET', :line1 => '12 Testing Lane', :city => 'Brisbane')

To add to a belongs_to association use the build_{association} method. For example:

invoice.build_contact(:name => 'ABC Company')

Updating

If the primary GUID for the record is present, the library will attempt to update the record instead of creating it. It is important that this record is downloaded from the Xero API first before attempting an update. For example:

contact = xero.Contact.find("cd09aa49-134d-40fb-a52b-b63c6a91d712")
contact.name = "Another Name Change"
contact.save

Have a look at the models in lib/xeroizer/models/ to see the valid attributes, associations and minimum validation requirements for each of the record types.

Some Xero endpoints, such as Payment, will only accept specific attributes for updates. Because the library does not have this knowledge encoded (and doesn't do dirty tracking of attributes), it's necessary to construct new objects instead of using the ones retrieved from Xero:

delete_payment = gateway.Payment.build(id: payment.id, status: 'DELETED')
delete_payment.save

Bulk Creates & Updates

Xero has a hard daily limit on the number of API requests you can make (currently 5,000 requests per account per day). To save on requests, you can batch creates and updates into a single PUT or POST call, like so:

contact1 = xero.Contact.create(some_attributes)
xero.Contact.batch_save do
  contact1.email_address = "foo@bar.com"
  contact2 = xero.Contact.build(some_other_attributes)
  contact3 = xero.Contact.build(some_more_attributes)
end

batch_save will issue one PUT request for every 2,000 unsaved records built within its block, and one POST request for every 2,000 existing records that have been altered within its block. If any of the unsaved records aren't valid, it'll return false before sending anything across the wire; otherwise, it returns true. batch_save takes one optional argument: the number of records to create/update per request. (Defaults to 2,000.)

If you'd rather build and send the records manually, there's a save_records method:

contact1 = xero.Contact.build(some_attributes)
contact2 = xero.Contact.build(some_other_attributes)
contact3 = xero.Contact.build(some_more_attributes)
xero.Contact.save_records([contact1, contact2, contact3])

It has the same return values as batch_save.

Errors

If a record doesn't match its internal validation requirements, the #save method will return false and the #errors attribute will be populated with what went wrong.

For example:

contact = xero.Contact.build
saved = contact.save

# contact.errors will contain [[:name, "can't be blank"]]

#errors_for(:attribute_name) is a helper method to return just the errors associated with that attribute. For example:

contact.errors_for(:name) # will contain ["can't be blank"]

If something goes really wrong and the particular validation isn't handled by the internal validators then the library may raise a Xeroizer::ApiException.

Example Use Cases

Creating & Paying an invoice:

contact = xero.Contact.first

# Build the Invoice, add a LineItem and save it
invoice = xero.Invoice.build(:type => "ACCREC", :contact => contact, :date => DateTime.new(2017,10,19), :due_date => DateTime.new(2017,11,19))

invoice.add_line_item(:description => 'test', :unit_amount => '200.00', :quantity => '1', :account_code => '200')

invoice.save

# An invoice created without a status will default to 'DRAFT'
invoice.approved?

# Payments can only be created against 'AUTHORISED' invoices
invoice.approve!

# Find the first bank account
bank_account = xero.Account.first(:where => {:type => 'BANK'})

# Create & save the payment
payment = xero.Payment.build(:invoice => invoice, :account => bank_account, :amount => '220.00')
payment.save

# Reload the invoice from the Xero API
invoice = xero.Invoice.find(invoice.id)

# Invoice status is now "PAID" & Payment details have been returned as well
invoice.status
invoice.payments.first
invoice.payments.first.date

Reports

All Xero reports except GST report can be accessed through Xeroizer.

Currently, only generic report access functionality exists. This will be extended to provide a more report-specific version of the data in the future (public submissions are welcome).

Reports are accessed like the following example:

trial_balance = xero.TrialBalance.get(:date => DateTime.new(2011,3,21))

profit_and_loss = xero.ProfitAndLoss.get(fromDate: Date.new(2019,4,1), toDate: Date.new(2019,5,1))

# Array containing report headings.
trial_balance.header.cells.map { | cell | cell.value }

# Report rows by section
trial_balance.sections.each do | section |
	puts "Section Title: #{section.title}"
	section.rows.each do | row |
		puts "\t#{row.cells.map { | cell | cell.value }.join("\t")}"
	end
end

# Summary row (if only one on the report)
trial_balance.summary.cells.map { | cell | cell.value }

# All report rows (including HeaderRow, SectionRow, Row and SummaryRow)
trial_balance.rows.each do | row |
	case row
		when Xeroizer::Report::HeaderRow
			# do something with header

		when Xeroizer::Report::SectionRow
			# do something with section, will need to step into the rows for this section

		when Xeroizer::Report::Row
			# do something for standard report rows

		when Xeroizer::Report::SummaryRow
			# do something for summary rows

	end
end

Xero API Rate Limits

The Xero API imposes the following limits on calls per organisation:

• A limit of 60 API calls in any 60 second period
• A limit of 5000 API calls in any 24 hour period

By default, the library will raise a Xeroizer::OAuth::RateLimitExceeded exception when one of these limits is exceeded.

If required, the library can handle these exceptions internally by sleeping for a configurable number of seconds and then repeating the last request. You can set this option when initializing an application:

# Sleep for 2 seconds every time the rate limit is exceeded.
client = Xeroizer::PublicApplication.new(YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY,
                                         YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET,
                                         :rate_limit_sleep => 2)

Xero API Nonce Used

The Xero API seems to reject requests due to conflicts on occasion.

By default, the library will raise a Xeroizer::OAuth::NonceUsed exception when one of these limits is exceeded.

If required, the library can handle these exceptions internally by sleeping 1 second and then repeating the last request. You can set this option when initializing an application:

# Sleep for 1 second and retry up to 3 times when Xero claims the nonce was used.
client = Xeroizer::PublicApplication.new(YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY,
                                         YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET,
                                         :nonce_used_max_attempts => 3)

Logging

You can add an optional parameter to the Xeroizer Application initialization, to pass a logger object that will need to respond_to :info. For example, in a rails app:

XeroLogger = Logger.new('log/xero.log', 'weekly')
client = Xeroizer::PublicApplication.new(YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY,
                                         YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET,
                                         :logger => XeroLogger)

HTTP Callbacks

You can provide "before", "after" and "around" callbacks which will be invoked every time Xeroizer makes an HTTP request, which is potentially useful for both throttling and logging:

Xeroizer::PublicApplication.new(
  credentials[:key], credentials[:secret],
  before_request: ->(request) { puts "Hitting this URL: #{request.url}" },
  after_request: ->(request, response) { puts "Got this response: #{response.code}" },
  around_request: -> (request, &block)  { puts "About to send request"; block.call; puts "After request"}
)

The request parameter is a custom Struct with url, headers, body, and params methods. The response parameter is a Net::HTTPResponse object.

Unit Price Precision

By default, the API accepts unit prices (UnitAmount) to two decimals places. If you require greater precision, you can opt-in to 4 decimal places by setting an optional parameter when initializing an application:

client = Xeroizer::PublicApplication.new(YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_KEY,
                                         YOUR_OAUTH_CONSUMER_SECRET,
                                         :unitdp => 4)

This option adds the unitdp=4 query string parameter to all requests for models with line items - invoices, credit notes, bank transactions and receipts.

Tests

The tests within the repository can be run by setting up a Private App. You can create a Private App in the developer portal, it's suggested that you create it against the Demo Company (AU). Demo Company expires after 28 days, so you will need to reset it and create a new Private App if you Demo Company has expired. Make sure you create the Demo Company in Australia region.

Once you have created your Private App, set these environment variables:

EXPORT CONSUMER_KEY="your private app's consumer key"
EXPORT CONSUMER_SECRET="your private app's consumer secret"
EXPORT PRIVATE_KEY_PATH="the path to your private app's private key"

PRIVATE_KEY_PATH is the path to the private key for your Private App (you uploaded the Public Key when you created the Private App)

Then run the tests

rake test

Contributors

Xeroizer was inspired by the https://github.com/tlconnor/xero_gateway gem created by Tim Connor and Nik Wakelin and portions of the networking and authentication code are based completely off this project. Copyright for these components remains held in the name of Tim Connor.