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Direct link to image file

Hi, I'd like to know if there is a way to create a direct link to a file using the API. My app requires sending an image link to a 3rd party's API for image recognition. When I test the link created using "create_shared_link_with_settings", I get something like

www.dropbox.com/s/8um0tttqgbjq5c7/my_image.jpg

But it is not recognised as an image. Thanks

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Accepted answers

TaylorKrusen

Thanks for the link. Neat tool. I found a solution!

The share/get_temporary_link is the one you want. You can test it out in the API explorer real quick to verify before you write the code.

Cheers!

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TaylorKrusen

Hi,

Is the 3rd party API you're calling expecting a file or a URL to an image?

I'd expect it to need the entire file, in which case you'll need to download (files/download) the file onto your server and upload the file to the other API for processing.

danc222

Hi, thanks for the reply. The API is expecting a URL to the image. You can actually see for yourself here https://imagga.com/auto-tagging-demo

Links generated via the Dropbox API do not work as I assume the URL given is a 'container' with meta data, download links and comments etc. I am looking for a direct link to the media. Is this possible with Dropbox? Thanks

danc222

To add some more information:

I created a link of an image and got something that looked like:
www.dropbox.com/s/8um0tttqgbjq5c7/my_image.jpg

But after downloading the image to my desktop, the actual link to the image file looked like:https://uc16303a726d517a4932231f53ee.dl.dropboxusercontent.com/cd/0/get/AjqdFl9BQdUPdRx5SUC83nDAmmblEed32xSG8mQqZdZzmQuzzl7tylLUExaBUG6blzESKf-QpaTZRsaL8SP-TLfY5ocst4aL5pbQQF8nAA3A/file

This form of URL works with the API in question. So my question is...is there a way to generate this URL?

TaylorKrusen

Thanks for the link. Neat tool. I found a solution!

The share/get_temporary_link is the one you want. You can test it out in the API explorer real quick to verify before you write the code.

Cheers!

danc222

Thanks Taylor, that seems to do the trick! I see temporary links expire after 4 hours but new ones can be generated on demand. Works fine for me.

Busy beaver

Idk is it legit, but I found a solution here - https://zapier.com/blog/generate-direct-dropbox-link/

It is just to replace "www.dropbox.com" in your url with "dl.dropboxusercontent.com". So in your case it would be dl.dropboxusercontent.com/s/8um0tttqgbjq5c7/my_image.jpg .

Whois tells that that domain belongs to the same company as dropbox.com so probably that's not a third-party website.