CatDataPages

Source code for a Flask website populated with data from the CatAPI, hosted on Render.

Cat-Data-Pages.onrender.com

Contents

• Motivation
• Features
  • Cat Breed Information
  • API
  • Data Demonstration
• Deployment
  • Render
  • Local
• Updates

Motivation

Make an interesting, fun page using data on cat breeds provided from The Cat API. Include details on data processing for demonstration/education.

Features

Cat Breed Information

• List index of data pages for each breed
• Side-by-side comparison page
• Choropleth map of cat breed origins

JSON API

• Detailed descriptions with examples

	Description	Scheme
Random Cat Image	random cat image, updated every 10 minutes	api/image
Breed Names	list of cat breeds, helpful for data requests	api/names
Cat Breed Data	type info / stats / graph for a specified or random cat	api/<cat>/<type> info, stats, graphs

Data Demonstration

• Pages detailing how the CatAPI data was processed and presented
  • Pandas, Matplotlib, and Plotly code demonstration and discussion
• Pages analyzing the overall data distributions

Deployment

The current version of this project was built with Python 3.10, and the packages listed in requirements.txt.

pip install -r requirements.txt

Render

Cat-Data-Pages can be run in earlier Python versions using the more general requirements for render, which does not list specific package versions.

pip install -r render_requirements.txt

This was utilized to avoid build errors in Render.

# settings
Name = Cat-Data-Pages
Branch = main
Build Command = pip install --upgrade pip setuptools wheel && pip install -r requirements_render.txt
Start Command = gunicorn -w 2 app:app
# testing "gunicorn --workers=2 --threads=4 app:app" for start command

# environment
PYTHON_VERSION = 3.10.9
TZ = America/Los_Angeles

gthread worker type used instead of sync if threads > 1

Local Installation

This project can be deployed locally using the default Flask Werkzeug server. Download the source code to a directory and see the Flask documentation help setting up a virtual environment, installing requirements, and options for running the application.

Run in debug mode:

cd your-directory
# activate virtual environment
flask --debug run

Updates

This project was recently updated (Dec 2021 --> Dec 2022) as I moved it to Render from Heroku.

• Documentation on Github
  • will leave sparse and provide links to project and/or screenshots
• Improved formatting for some pages, mainly widened margins
  • source code links in data story pages, version list in homepage footer
• Bugfixes for saving graphs (create folder if not exists), and generating map
• Changed method of saving random cat image
  • from txt file with link --> JSON file with dictionary --> storing dictionary in memory
  • cleaned up code a little, changed to class
  • added try / except block in case of empty return from thecatapi
• Simple API and description page
  • Returns URL, time remaining for random cat image
  • Returns list of cat names to facilitate other requests
  • Returns graphs/information/stats for a particular or random cat
• Gunicorn deployment on Render, associated requirements file
  • optimizing # workers / threads . . .

---

• Jan 2023
  • updated code for change in cat breed URL
    • added note in data cleaning page, accordingly
  • changed app to prepopulate all matplotlib graphs on startup, should provide faster responses to cat pages
    • this takes ~20s per cat, or about 25 minutes on the free plan
  • formatting changes to homepage and api info page