Beginners Guide: Get Data From Wrike’s API Without Coding via Postman

Mastering REST API is not an easy job — for the majority of use cases some advanced technical knowledge is needed, and the ability to code is essential if you want to create custom applications which fit your specific business needs.

But what if you’re not a developer or programmer? What if you’re a business person and you want to use Wrike’s API to access data? Is there a way to use APIs without coding?

The answer is YES! There are plenty of ways to interact with APIs without writing a single line of code. In this post I’ll describe one of the easiest ways to get started with Wrike’s API by using Postman, a popular Chrome add-in (now also a separate application).

Before You Start

You need:

• The Postman app. Get it here.
• An active Wrike account. It can be any subscription type.
• A registered Wrike API application and its permanent token. For more details see our post Get Started with Wrike’s API and our article about the Developer Portal.

Background on Wrike’s API and Postman

Wrike

Wrike’s API supports GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE type requests and produces a JSON response which contains the entity type in the ‘kind’ field and an array of entities in the ‘data’ field.

HTTP requests are needed to get, post, modify, or delete data tied to a specific endpoint, which is indicated in the request URL. All HTTP requests on Wrike's primary data center start with ‘https://www.wrike.com/api/v4/’ base URL. You can determine your base URL by looking at the URL in the address bar when you access your Wrike instance in a browser. However, the URL endpoints may vary as they are related to specific entities on Wrike’s side (like /tasks, /folders, /contacts, etc).

Additional parameters are required to define or filter data. You can find the list of supported methods and parameters in our API documentation.

Postman

Postman is an application used for interacting with APIs. Postman works by sending HTTP requests and can add request headers and parameters. The request builder is organized by tabs—one tab per request. Responses (from the API or server you're working with) are displayed on a separate section of the same tab, which makes Postman convenient for both sending and receiving data.

Set Up Postman to Access Wrike Data

Before starting we need to authorize Postman so that it can access data in Wrike. To do this we need to pass Postman’s Authorization header to Wrike’s API.

1. Set up an environment in Postman. Check Postman’s guide on setting up environments to learn how to do this.
2. Create the ‘access_token’ Key with the Key Value editor and paste your Wrike app’s permanent access token as the Value. Click  ‘Add’ and close the environment editing interface.
3. Make sure your custom environment is selected in the picker in the top-right corner of your main screen.
4. You can now add the Authorization header to any request (this step is required for requests to Wrike’s API) by using the key ‘Authorization’ and value: ‘bearer {{access_token}}’.

Use Postman to Get Data from Wrike’s API

All preparations are done, now on to the fun part!

In the example below, we’re going to get a complete list of Timelog-type records from the entire Wrike account

Obtain the list of Timelog entries.

Make a GET call to https://www.wrike.com/api/v4/timelogs . More details on our Query Timelogs page.

A list of Timelog records is generated, with extra parameters in JSON format.

Please note, you won’t be able to obtain data related to Tasks, Folders, or Projects which aren’t shared with the user you are authorized as.  

You can use the same framework to pull the hours logged in the Time Tracker for any Wrike user, Folder, Project, or Task. You can use parameters to narrow down the results, our docs will provide you with the needed information.

Postman also has detailed documentation, which you may find helpful for mastering the possibilities available via API: Postman help docs.

Let me know how this works for your team! Will be happy to answer your questions.