Alex Yatskov bd071a3dfe Updating README.md

2017-09-29 17:03:48 -07:00

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AnkiConnect

The AnkiConnect plugin enables external applications such as Yomichan to communicate with Anki over a network interface. This software makes it possible to execute queries against the user's card deck, automatically create new vocabulary and Kanji flash cards, and more. AnkiConnect is compatible with the latest stable (2.0.x) and alpha (2.1.x) releases of Anki and works on Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X.

Installation

The installation process is similar to that of other Anki plugins and can be accomplished in three steps:

Open the Install Add-on dialog by selecting Tools > Add-ons > Browse & Install in Anki.
Input 2055492159 into the text box labeled Code and press the OK button to proceed.
Restart Anki when prompted to do so in order to complete the installation of AnkiConnect.

Anki must be kept running in the background in order for other applications to be able to use AnkiConnect. You can verify that AnkiConnect is running at any time by accessing localhost:8765 in your browser. If the server is running, you should see the message AnkiConnect v.5 displayed in your browser window.

Notes for Windows Users

Windows users may see a firewall nag dialog box appear on Anki startup. This occurs because AnkiConnect hosts a local server in order to enable other applications to connect to it. The host application, Anki, must be unblocked for this plugin to function correctly.

Notes for Mac OS X Users

Starting with Mac OS X Mavericks, a feature named App Nap has been introduced to the operating system. This feature causes certain applications which are open (but not visible) to be placed in a suspended state. As this behavior causes AnkiConnect to stop working while you have another window in the foreground, App Nap should be disabled for Anki:

Start the Terminal application.

Execute the following command in the terminal window:

defaults write net.ichi2.anki NSAppSleepDisabled -bool true

Restart Anki.

Application Interface for Developers

AnkiConnect exposes Anki features to external applications via an easy to use RESTful API. After it is installed, this plugin will initialize a minimal HTTP sever running on port 8765 every time Anki executes. Other applications (including browser extensions) can then communicate with it via HTTP POST requests.

By default, AnkiConnect will only bind the HTTP server to the 127.0.0.1 IP address, so that you will only be able to access it from the same host on which it is running. If you need to access it over a network, you can set the environment variable ANKICONNECT_BIND_ADDRESS to change the binding address. For example, you can set it to 0.0.0.0 in order to bind it to all network interfaces on your host.

Sample Invocation

Every request consists of a JSON-encoded object containing an action, a version, and a set of contextual params. A simple example of a modern JavaScript application communicating with the extension is illustrated below:

function ankiConnectInvoke(action, version, params={}) {
    return new Promise((resolve, reject) => {
        const xhr = new XMLHttpRequest();
        xhr.addEventListener('error', () => reject('failed to connect to AnkiConnect'));
        xhr.addEventListener('load', () => {
            try {
                const response = JSON.parse(xhr.responseText);
                if (response.error) {
                    throw response.error;
                } else {
                    if (response.hasOwnProperty('result')) {
                        resolve(response.result);
                    } else {
                        reject('failed to get results from AnkiConnect');
                    }
                }
            } catch (e) {
                reject(e);
            }
        });

        xhr.open('POST', 'http://127.0.0.1:8765');
        xhr.send(JSON.stringify({action, version, params}));
    });
}

try {
    const result = await ankiConnectInvoke('deckNames', 5);
    console.log(`got list of decks: ${result}`);
} catch (e) {
    console.log(`error getting decks: ${e}`);
}

Or using curl from the command line:

curl localhost:8765 -X POST -d '{"action": "deckNames", "version": 5}'

AnkiConnect will respond with an object containing two fields: result and error. The result field contains the return value of the executed API, and the error field is a description of any exception thrown during API execution (the value null is used if execution completed successfully).

Sample successful response:

{"result": ["Default", "Filtered Deck 1"], "error": null}

Samples of failed responses:

{"result": null, "error": "unsupported action"}

{"result": null, "error": "guiBrowse() got an unexpected keyword argument 'foobar'"}

For compatibility with clients designed to work with older versions of AnkiConnect, failing to provide a version field in the request will make the version default to 4. Furthermore, when the provided version is level 4 or below, the API response will only contain the value of the result; no error field is available for error handling.

Supported Actions

Below is a comprehensive list of currently supported actions. Note that deprecated APIs will continue to function despite not being listed on this page as long as your request is labeled with a version number corresponding to when the API was available for use.

This page currently documents version 5 of the API. Make sure to include this version number in your requests to guarantee that your application continues to function properly in the future.

Miscellaneous

version

Gets the version of the API exposed by this plugin. Currently versions 1 through 5 are defined.

This should be the first call you make to make sure that your application and AnkiConnect are able to communicate properly with each other. New versions of AnkiConnect are backwards compatible; as long as you are using actions which are available in the reported AnkiConnect version or earlier, everything should work fine.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "version"
}
```
Sample result:
```
5
```
upgrade

Displays a confirmation dialog box in Anki asking the user if they wish to upgrade AnkiConnect to the latest version from the project's master branch on GitHub. Returns a boolean value indicating if the plugin was upgraded or not.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "upgrade"
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```

multi

Performs multiple actions in one request, returning an array with the response of each action (in the given order).

Sample request:

{
    "action": "multi",
    "params": {
        "actions": [
            {"action": "deckNames"},
            {
                "action": "browse",
                "params": {"query": "deck:current"}
            }
        ]
    }
}

Sample result:

[
    ["Default"],
    [1494723142483, 1494703460437, 1494703479525]
]

Decks

deckNames

Gets the complete list of deck names for the current user.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "deckNames"
}
```
Sample result:
```
[
    "Default"
]
```
deckNamesAndIds

Gets the complete list of deck names and their respective IDs for the current user.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "deckNamesAndIds"
}
```
Sample result:
```
{
    "Default": 1
}
```

getDecks

Accepts an array of card IDs and returns an object with each deck name as a key, and its value an array of the given cards which belong to it.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "getDecks",
    "params": {
        "cards": [1502298036657, 1502298033753, 1502032366472]
    }
}

Sample result:

{
    "Default": [1502032366472],
    "Japanese::JLPT N3": [1502298036657, 1502298033753]
}

changeDeck

Moves cards with the given IDs to a different deck, creating the deck if it doesn't exist yet.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "changeDeck",
    "params": {
        "cards": [1502098034045, 1502098034048, 1502298033753],
        "deck": "Japanese::JLPT N3"
    }
}

Sample result:

null

deleteDecks

Deletes decks with the given names. If cardsToo is true (defaults to false if unspecified), the cards within the deleted decks will also be deleted; otherwise they will be moved to the default deck.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "deleteDecks",
    "params": {
        "decks": ["Japanese::JLPT N5", "Easy Spanish"],
        "cardsToo": true
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
null
```

Deck Configurations

getDeckConfig

Gets the config group object for the given deck.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "getDeckConfig",
    "params": {
        "deck": "Default"
    }
}

Sample result:

{
    "lapse": {
        "leechFails": 8,
        "delays": [10],
        "minInt": 1,
        "leechAction": 0,
        "mult": 0
    },
    "dyn": false,
    "autoplay": true,
    "mod": 1502970872,
    "id": 1,
    "maxTaken": 60,
    "new": {
        "bury": true,
        "order": 1,
        "initialFactor": 2500,
        "perDay": 20,
        "delays": [1, 10],
        "separate": true,
        "ints": [1, 4, 7]
    },
    "name": "Default",
    "rev": {
        "bury": true,
        "ivlFct": 1,
        "ease4": 1.3,
        "maxIvl": 36500,
        "perDay": 100,
        "minSpace": 1,
        "fuzz": 0.05
    },
    "timer": 0,
    "replayq": true,
    "usn": -1
}

saveDeckConfig

Saves the given config group, returning true on success or false if the ID of the config group is invalid (i.e. it does not exist).

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "saveDeckConfig",
    "params": {
        "config": (config group object)
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```
setDeckConfigId

Changes the configuration group for the given decks to the one with the given ID. Returns true on success or false if the given configuration group or any of the given decks do not exist.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "setDeckConfigId",
    "params": {
        "decks": ["Default"],
        "configId": 1
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```
cloneDeckConfigId

Creates a new config group with the given name, cloning from the group with the given ID, or from the default group if this is unspecified. Returns the ID of the new config group, or false if the specified group to clone from does not exist.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "cloneDeckConfigId",
    "params": {
        "name": "Copy of Default",
        "cloneFrom": 1
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
1502972374573
```
removeDeckConfigId

Removes the config group with the given ID, returning true if successful, or false if attempting to remove either the default config group (ID = 1) or a config group that does not exist.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "removeDeckConfigId",
    "params": {
        "configId": 1502972374573
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```

Models

modelNames

Gets the complete list of model names for the current user.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "modelNames"
}

Sample result:

[
    "Basic",
    "Basic (and reversed card)"
]

modelNamesAndIds

Gets the complete list of model names and their corresponding IDs for the current user.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "modelNamesAndIds"
}

Sample result:

{
    "Basic": 1483883011648,
    "Basic (and reversed card)": 1483883011644,
    "Basic (optional reversed card)": 1483883011631,
    "Cloze": 1483883011630
}

modelFieldNames

Gets the complete list of field names for the provided model name.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "modelFieldNames",
    "params": {
        "modelName": "Basic"
    }
}

Sample result:

[
    "Front",
    "Back"
]

modelFieldsOnTemplates

Returns an object indicating the fields on the question and answer side of each card template for the given model name. The question side is given first in each array.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "modelFieldsOnTemplates",
    "params": {
        "modelName": "Basic (and reversed card)"
    }
}

Sample result:

{
    "Card 1": [
        ["Front"],
        ["Back"]
    ],
    "Card 2": [
        ["Back"],
        ["Front"]
    ]
}

Note Creation

addNote

Creates a note using the given deck and model, with the provided field values and tags. Returns the identifier of the created note created on success, and null on failure.

AnkiConnect can download audio files and embed them in newly created notes. The corresponding audio note member is optional and can be omitted. If you choose to include it, the url and filename fields must be also defined. The skipHash field can be optionally provided to skip the inclusion of downloaded files with an MD5 hash that matches the provided value. This is useful for avoiding the saving of error pages and stub files. The fields member is a list of fields that should play audio when the card is displayed in Anki.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "addNote",
    "params": {
        "note": {
            "deckName": "Default",
            "modelName": "Basic",
            "fields": {
                "Front": "front content",
                "Back": "back content"
            },
            "tags": [
                "yomichan"
            ],
            "audio": {
                "url": "https://assets.languagepod101.com/dictionary/japanese/audiomp3.php?kanji=猫&kana=ねこ",
                "filename": "yomichan_ねこ_猫.mp3",
                "skipHash": "7e2c2f954ef6051373ba916f000168dc",
                "fields": "Front"
            }
        }
    }
}

Sample result:

1496198395707

addNotes

Creates multiple notes using the given deck and model, with the provided field values and tags. Returns an array of identifiers of the created notes (notes that could not be created will have a null identifier). Please see the documentation for addNote for an explanation of objects in the notes array.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "addNotes",
    "params": {
        "notes": [
            {
                "deckName": "Default",
                "modelName": "Basic",
                "fields": {
                    "Front": "front content",
                    "Back": "back content"
                },
                "tags": [
                    "yomichan"
                ],
                "audio": {
                    "url": "https://assets.languagepod101.com/dictionary/japanese/audiomp3.php?kanji=猫&kana=ねこ",
                    "filename": "yomichan_ねこ_猫.mp3",
                    "skipHash": "7e2c2f954ef6051373ba916f000168dc",
                    "fields": "Front"
                }
            }
        ]
    }
}

Sample result:

[
    1496198395707,
    null
]

canAddNotes

Accepts an array of objects which define parameters for candidate notes (see addNote) and returns an array of booleans indicating whether or not the parameters at the corresponding index could be used to create a new note.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "canAddNotes",
    "params": {
        "notes": [
            {
                "deckName": "Default",
                "modelName": "Basic",
                "fields": {
                    "Front": "front content",
                    "Back": "back content"
                },
                "tags": [
                    "yomichan"
                ]
            }
        ]
    }
}

Sample result:

[
    true
]

Note Tags

addTags

Adds tags to notes by note ID.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "addTags",
    "params": {
        "notes": [1483959289817, 1483959291695],
        "tags": "european-languages"
    }
}

Sample result:

null

removeTags

Remove tags from notes by note ID.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "removeTags",
    "params": {
        "notes": [1483959289817, 1483959291695],
        "tags": "european-languages"
    }
}

Sample result:

null

Card Suspension

suspend

Suspend cards by card ID; returns true if successful (at least one card wasn't already suspended) or false otherwise.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "suspend",
    "params": {
        "cards": [1483959291685, 1483959293217]
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```
unsuspend

Unsuspend cards by card ID; returns true if successful (at least one card was previously suspended) or false otherwise.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "unsuspend",
    "params": {
        "cards": [1483959291685, 1483959293217]
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```

areSuspended

Returns an array indicating whether each of the given cards is suspended (in the same order).

Sample request:

{
    "action": "areSuspended",
    "params": {
        "cards": [1483959291685, 1483959293217]
    }
}

Sample result:

[false, true]

Card Intervals

areDue

Returns an array indicating whether each of the given cards is due (in the same order). Note: cards in the learning queue with a large interval (over 20 minutes) are treated as not due until the time of their interval has passed, to match the way Anki treats them when reviewing.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "areDue",
    "params": {
        "cards": [1483959291685, 1483959293217]
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
[false, true]
```

getIntervals

Returns an array of the most recent intervals for each given card ID, or a 2-dimensional array of all the intervals for each given card ID when complete is true. (Negative intervals are in seconds and positive intervals in days.)

Sample request 1:

{
    "action": "getIntervals",
    "params": {
        "cards": [1502298033753, 1502298036657]
    }
}

Sample result 1:

[-14400, 3]

Sample request 2:

{
    "action": "getIntervals",
    "params": {
        "cards": [1502298033753, 1502298036657],
        "complete": true
    }
}

Sample result 2:

[
    [-120, -180, -240, -300, -360, -14400],
    [-120, -180, -240, -300, -360, -14400, 1, 3]
]

Finding Notes and Cards

findNotes

Returns an array of note IDs for a given query (same query syntax as guiBrowse).

Sample request:

{
    "action": "findNotes",
    "params": {
        "query": "deck:current"
    }
}

Sample result:

[
    1483959289817,
    1483959291695
]

findCards

Returns an array of card IDs for a given query (functionally identical to guiBrowse but doesn't use the GUI for better performance).

Sample request:

{
    "action": "findCards",
    "params": {
        "query": "deck:current"
    }
}

Sample result:

[
    1494723142483,
    1494703460437,
    1494703479525
]

cardsToNotes

Returns an (unordered) array of note IDs for the given card IDs. For cards with the same note, the ID is only given once in the array.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "cardsToNotes",
    "params": {
        "cards": [1502098034045, 1502098034048, 1502298033753]
    }
}

Sample result:

[
    1502098029797,
    1502298025183
]

Media File Storage

storeMediaFile

Stores a file with the specified base64-encoded contents inside the media folder.

Note: to prevent Anki from removing files not used by any cards (e.g. for configuration files), prefix the filename with an underscore. These files are still synchronized to AnkiWeb.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "storeMediaFile",
    "params": {
        "filename": "_hello.txt",
        "data": "SGVsbG8sIHdvcmxkIQ=="
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
null
```
Content of _hello.txt:
```
Hello world!
```
retrieveMediaFile

Retrieves the base64-encoded contents of the specified file, returning false if the file does not exist.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "retrieveMediaFile",
    "params": {
        "filename": "_hello.txt"
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
"SGVsbG8sIHdvcmxkIQ=="
```

deleteMediaFile

Deletes the specified file inside the media folder.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "deleteMediaFile",
    "params": {
        "filename": "_hello.txt"
    }
}

Sample result:

null

Graphical

guiBrowse

Invokes the card browser and searches for a given query. Returns an array of identifiers of the cards that were found.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "guiBrowse",
    "params": {
        "query": "deck:current"
    }
}

Sample result:

[
    1494723142483,
    1494703460437,
    1494703479525
]

guiAddCards

Invokes the AddCards dialog.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "guiAddCards"
}
```
Sample result:
```
null
```

guiCurrentCard

Returns information about the current card or null if not in review mode.

Sample request:

{
    "action": "guiCurrentCard"
}

Sample result:

{
    "answer": "back content",
    "question": "front content",
    "deckName": "Default",
    "modelName": "Basic",
    "fieldOrder": 0,
    "fields": {
        "Front": {
            "value": "front content",
            "order": 0
        },
        "Back": {
            "value": "back content",
            "order": 1
        }
    },
    "cardId": 1498938915662,
    "buttons": [1, 2, 3]
}

guiStartCardTimer

Starts or resets the 'timerStarted' value for the current card. This is useful for deferring the start time to when it is displayed via the API, allowing the recorded time taken to answer the card to be more accurate when calling guiAnswerCard.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "guiStartCardTimer"
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```
guiShowQuestion

Shows question text for the current card; returns true if in review mode or false otherwise.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "guiShowQuestion"
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```
guiShowAnswer

Shows answer text for the current card; returns true if in review mode or false otherwise.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "guiShowAnswer"
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```
guiAnswerCard

Answers the current card; returns true if succeeded or false otherwise. Note that the answer for the current card must be displayed before before any answer can be accepted by Anki.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "guiAnswerCard",
    "params": {
        "ease": 1
    }
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```
guiDeckOverview

Opens the Deck Overview screen for the deck with the given name; returns true if succeeded or false otherwise.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "guiDeckOverview",
	"params": {
		"name": "Default"
	}
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```
guiDeckBrowser

Opens the Deck Browser screen.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "guiDeckBrowser"
}
```
Sample result:
```
null
```
guiDeckReview

Starts review for the deck with the given name; returns true if succeeded or false otherwise.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "guiDeckReview",
	"params": {
		"name": "Default"
	}
}
```
Sample result:
```
true
```
guiExitAnki

Schedules a request to close Anki after 1s. This operation is asynchronous, so it will return immediately and won't wait until Anki actually exits.

Sample request:
```
{
    "action": "guiExitAnki"
}
```
Sample result:
```
null
```

License

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program. If not, see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/.

28 KiB Raw Blame History

AnkiConnect

Installation

Notes for Windows Users

Notes for Mac OS X Users

Application Interface for Developers

Sample Invocation

Supported Actions

Miscellaneous

Decks

Deck Configurations

Models

Note Creation

Note Tags

Card Suspension

Card Intervals

Finding Notes and Cards

Media File Storage

Graphical

License

28 KiB

Raw Blame History