LonelyCache

Howdy,

I was checking out the forums and looking around and came across viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1925. This thread talked about using special accounts to fill the database. It confused me.

I thought just by logging in to lonelycache.com, lonelycache.com received a token for my geocaching.com account. With this token, can't lonelycache.com use my credentials to fetch caches and cache data until the tokens expire? And as quota is issued separately for all API partners this would not interfere with GSAK or phone apps usage.

Hopefully there are more premium subscribers providing tokens than the handful of special accounts.

My previous thought was just logging in was helping out but that does not seem to be the case.

You're correct, when one logs onto LonelyCache, LonelyCache negotiates authorization to access the Geocaching.com API on behalf of that user. That authorization can be extended until revoked by the user. You are also correct that the authorization only impacts use of LonelyCache, not other API partner applications.

Development of LonelyCache started the beginning of 2012, so almost eight years ago. At that time, the API was in its infancy and still being developed. Since then the API has evolved quite a bit to where it is today and so has LonelyCache. There were a lot of unknowns when development started and a lot of things have changed. There is also an API Partner agreement between LonelyCache and Geocaching HQ. That agreement has evolved over the years, but there are limitations imposed by it on how LonelyCache may use the API and access and share geocaching.com data. All that is a long winded way of saying that certain design decisions were made on how LonelyCache would maintain it's database and respect the API agreement with the knowledge and understanding of the time. One of those decisions was to have dedicated accounts used to access the API to maintain the LonelyCache database. LonelyCache users would log in, but API use by a user was very limited. Over the years, that use has expanded quite a bit but is still limited to updating that user's recent finds and hides, and some other requests.

You bring up a very good point that LonelyCache could (should?) extend it's use of its members API authorization to better maintain it's database and is something worth investigating.

Thanks!