Parts Depot, Inc Web Services

Parts Depot, Inc is the leading supplier of auto, bicycle, and roller-blade parts. We provide online services to enable both browser-based and machine-based clients:

We Conform to the Parts Industries Consortium Schemas!

Interactions with our services are all XML-based (for browser-clients this is transparent, as the XML is dynamically styled by the browser using a stylesheet specified in the XML). In compliance with the Parts Industries Consortium all our XML document conform to schemas defined by the consortium. See here for a complete list and description of the consortium schemas.

Using our online services

Get Parts List

This service allows a client to obtain a complete list of parts provided by Parts Depot. The list is obtained by issuing an HTTP GET to the following URL:

http://www.parts-depot.com/parts

This results in returning a list of parts, conforming to the Parts.xsd schema. Here is a sample parts list XML document (browser clients see here to see the styled view): 

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<Parts xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">
      <Part id="00345" xlink:href="http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/00345"/>
      <Part id="00346" xlink:href="http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/00346"/>
      <Part id="00347" xlink:href="http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/00347"/>
      <Part id="00348" xlink:href="http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/00348"/>
</Parts>
There are several things to note:

1. There is no reference to the schema that this document conforms to. The reason for this is security. Here is the schemaLocation that this conforms to:

http://www.parts-industries-consortium.org/parts.xsd

2. This document simply contains a list of part IDs. Detailed information about any part may be found by traversing the xlink hyperlink (xlink is the XML hyperlinking technology)

Get Part Details

Suppose that you are interested in getting detailed information about part 00345. You can either follow the hyperlink in the parts list (see above), or you may simply issue an HTTP GET to this ULR:

http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/00345

This results in returning detailed information about the part with ID=00345. The document returned conforms to the Part.xsd schema. Here is a sample XML document for this part (browser clients see here to see the styled view): 

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<Part xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">
      <Part-ID>00345</Part-ID>
      <Type>Type-A</Type>
      <Name>Widget-A</Name>
      <Description>This part is used within the frap assembly</Description>
      <Specification xlink:href="http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/00345/specification"/>
      <UnitCost currency="USD">0.10
      <Quantity>10
</Part>
Notes:

1. The URL for a part is formed by taking the part ID and appending it to "part/". That is,

http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/partID

2. As of this writing, the partID's range from 00345 to 00356. However, it is always best to first get the parts list, as the parts we carry is continually changing.

Get Part Specification

Each part has a specification document which is the industry-defined spec for the part. To obtain the spec for a part you can either use the URL provided in the part details document (see above) or you may simply issue an HTTP GET to this ULR (this returns the spec for part 00345):

http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/00345/specification

This results in returning the spec for the part with ID=00345. The document returned conforms to the Specification.xsd schema. Here is a sample XML document for this spec (browser clients see here to see the styled view): 

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<Specification>
      <Part-ID>00345
      <Dimensions>Circular with octagonal hole; chrome plated
</Specification
Notes:

1. The URL for a part spec is formed by appending "/specification" to the part ID. That is,

http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/partID/specification

2. As of this writing, the partID's range from 00345 to 00356. However, it is always best to first get the parts list, as the parts we carry is continually changing.

Errors

There are cases where you may recieve an error XML document (browser clients will view a styled document, see here for what it will look like). This may be due to specifying an invalid part ID, or due to problems at our site. Here is the format of all error documents: 
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<Exception>
    -- error message --
</Exception>
In the future we will provide more detailed error formats.

Summary of Services

Description Access URL Conforming schema Notes
Get a list of parts http://www.parts-depot.com/parts http://www.parts-industries-consortium.org/parts.xsd The document returned contains links to each part. Follow the links for more detailed information about a part
Get details on a part http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/partID http://www.parts-industries-consortium.org/part.xsd For partID specify the ID for the part desired. See the parts list for a complete list of ids
Get a part specification http://www.parts-depot.com/parts/partID/specification http://www.parts-industries-consortium.org/specification.xsd For partID specify the ID for the part desired. See the parts list for a complete list of ids

Error messages conform to the industry-defined schema: http://www.parts-industries-consortium.org/errors.xsd

Future Plans

In the future we plan on extending our services to enable

Questions/Comments

For any questions and comments please mail to: Roger L. Costello

Last updated: August 7, 2002