Get followers/ids from users with more than 75000 followers rate limit problem

camburon · 2013-02-05T22:43:55.000Z

Hi guys,

this post/question I consider is an extension of this recent post https://dev.twitter.com/discussions/14697, well the problem with the new API v1.1 I found with my app is that everyday I need to check the list of followers (all the followers) of my authenticated users in my app, with the new version of the API, because of the 15 API calls per 15 minutes window limit, my script will only grabs 75000 followers for that user (15 times the max amount of ids per cursor [5000]), so the question is,

how can I get all the followers from a user if this users exceeds 75000 followers?

should I store the cursor from the last followers/ids call?

are those cursors static? do they change between API calls?

I need help in this matter please because I dont want any kind of problems with the new implementation of this API and my users.

Thanks a lot!

episod · 2013-02-06T15:39:49.000Z

Yes, you can persist the cursor between calls. They are stable for the user you’re querying on behalf of. If a user has more followers/followings than you can fetch in a single rate limit window, wait for the current window to roll over to the next and resume from the cursor you stored.

Thanks,
Taylor

camburon · 2013-02-06T16:15:23.000Z

Thanks @episod!

camburon · 2013-02-09T20:43:05.000Z

But there is no way to fetch all the followers/following from a user that exceed the 75000 ids without having to wait until the 15 minutes time window resets?

*edit:

Sorry to extend this question but, the cursors provided in the API v1.0 are the same that the ones provided in v1.1, I mean, can I store v1.0 cursors in followers/ids API call and use it in v1.1?

Thanks

tisJYeung · 2013-12-24T13:15:09.000Z

I saved the last cursor and then resumed it at the next window. It did start, but cursor turned to “0” after another 50,000 followers, even though the user has more.

I’ve tried it with other accounts and the same issue persists. Please let me know how I can work around it, or if there is a better way to get all the followers of a user

gingerman · 2014-03-08T00:57:10.000Z

I think the only way around it would be to have multiple Twitter Apps, to swap over all your keys when you hit 15 calls and keep on harvesting the data you require. I’m not sure that the cursors would transfer between apps though ( anyone here know ? )