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Point a table to an API endpoint & Link Rows to it

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Kevin_Gutowski
6 - Interface Innovator
6 - Interface Innovator

Would be neat to be able to easily input a url for an API and have the response automatically generate an Airtable table. Then I want to manually (or ideally semi automatically) link rows in my other tables to this API data so I can then do other formulas and rollups.

Whenever data changes in the API endpoint, then it automatically updates my dependent columns.

7 Comments
ScottWorld
18 - Pluto
18 - Pluto

It’s highly unlikely that that will ever be natively built into Airtable, but you can already do that with several different tools: DataFetcher.com or Make.com or writing your own custom scripts within Airtable’s automations.

Bill_French
17 - Neptune
17 - Neptune

Is there a way to magically create new tables in bases through these (or any tools)?

ScottWorld
18 - Pluto
18 - Pluto

The Enterprise API allows creation of bases, tables, fields, and collaborators. Interestingly, it does not allow the creation of views.

Kevin_Gutowski
6 - Interface Innovator
6 - Interface Innovator

Why wouldn’t Airtable consider it? Data isn’t always fixed. Moreover, I’d like to easily extend my data with other datasets without manually downloading, converting, parsing it all in a tedious fashion.

https://www.superblocks.com is a great example for working with APIs and external datastores. Airtable has a great interface for managing data. Would be cool so see something in between.

Andy_Cloke
8 - Airtable Astronomer
8 - Airtable Astronomer

This is what the Data Fetcher extension is designed to do! Connect to any third-party REST API or remote file (e.g. a CSV file on a server somewhere) and update your base data when the data changes.

It can’t create tables but does create the fields (with suggested types) for you when you set up an API request for the first time.

Kevin_Gutowski
6 - Interface Innovator
6 - Interface Innovator

Pretty cool! Definitely will try it out for a few different things!

In my specific use case I have endpoints for each record that I’d like to call and parse which is a little different than what I was describing above.

CleanShot 2022-11-03 at 04.18.20@2x

Andy_Cloke
8 - Airtable Astronomer
8 - Airtable Astronomer

Nice! You can actually reference values from your table in Data Fetcher (even a whole URL), so it’ll do what you need: Use table values in requests - Data Fetcher Help Center

Of course, another option is scripting!