Python API's Require OAUTH_TOKEN and OAUTH_TOKEN_SECRET Keys

Question

How do I get these keys from LinkedIn?

OAUTH_TOKEN and OAUTH_TOKEN_SECRET 

When I register my application on LinkedIn Developer, I'm only getting:

CONSUMER_KEY, CONSUMER_SECRET

I have two Python functions which require it.

E.g. -

from linkedin import linkedin # pip install python-linkedin

# Define CONSUMER_KEY, CONSUMER_SECRET,  
# USER_TOKEN, and USER_SECRET from the credentials 
# provided in your LinkedIn application

CONSUMER_KEY = ''
CONSUMER_SECRET = ''
USER_TOKEN = ''
USER_SECRET = ''

RETURN_URL = '' # Not required for developer authentication

# Instantiate the developer authentication class

auth = linkedin.LinkedInDeveloperAuthentication(CONSUMER_KEY, CONSUMER_SECRET, 
                                USER_TOKEN, USER_SECRET, 
                                RETURN_URL, 
                                permissions=linkedin.PERMISSIONS.enums.values())

# Pass it in to the app...

app = linkedin.LinkedInApplication(auth)

# Use the app...

app.get_profile()

and #!/usr/bin/env python # encoding: utf-8 """ linkedin-2-query.py

Created by Thomas Cabrol on 2012-12-03.
Copyright (c) 2012 dataiku. All rights reserved.

Building the LinkedIn Graph

import oauth2 as oauth
import urlparse
import simplejson
import codecs

CONSUMER_KEY = "your-consumer-key-here"
CONSUMER_SECRET = "your-consumer-secret-here"
OAUTH_TOKEN = "your-oauth-token-here"
OAUTH_TOKEN_SECRET = "your-oauth-token-secret-here"

OUTPUT = "linked.csv"

def linkedin_connections():
    # Use your credentials to build the oauth client
    consumer = oauth.Consumer(key=CONSUMER_KEY, secret=CONSUMER_SECRET)
    token = oauth.Token(key=OAUTH_TOKEN, secret=OAUTH_TOKEN_SECRET)
    client = oauth.Client(consumer, token)
    # Fetch first degree connections
    resp, content = client.request('http://api.linkedin.com/v1/people/~/connections?format=json')
    results = simplejson.loads(content)    
    # File that will store the results
    output = codecs.open(OUTPUT, 'w', 'utf-8')
    # Loop thru the 1st degree connection and see how they connect to each other
    for result in results["values"]:
        con = "%s %s" % (result["firstName"].replace(",", " "), result["lastName"].replace(",", " "))
        print >>output, "%s,%s" % ("Thomas Cabrol",  con)
        # This is the trick, use the search API to get related connections
        u = "https://api.linkedin.com/v1/people/%s:(relation-to-viewer:(related-connections))?format=json" % result["id"]
        resp, content = client.request(u)
        rels = simplejson.loads(content)
        try:
            for rel in rels['relationToViewer']['relatedConnections']['values']:
                sec = "%s %s" % (rel["firstName"].replace(",", " "), rel["lastName"].replace(",", " "))
                print >>output, "%s,%s" % (con, sec)
        except:
            pass


if __name__ == '__main__':
    linkedin_connections()

I received this document from LinkedIn:

https://developer.linkedin.com/blog/posts/2015/transition-faq

Does this mean the API is now closed?

Answer 1

OAuth 1.0a is still supported by LinkedIn, but it is no longer encouraging new implementations.

You must request your own OAuth 1.0a token/secret values as part of the auth workflow. LinkedIn's application management console no longer automatically generates one for you as a convenience.

Switching to OAuth 2.0 would probably be an easier approach.

Further, please note that the call your library appears to be making to get a user's connections is no longer publicly available via the API as per the announcement made on LinkedIn's developer blog back in February (https://developer.linkedin.com/blog/posts/2015/developer-program-changes). So getting authentication working may not be the only problem you encounter.