Problem with API size and request rate limits

Developers Central
1

Hello, I wanted to transfer data of 24,000 records from Gmail via API to a document. (Text only)

I tried to stick to the rule of 10 connections per 6 seconds via the API. That’s why I’m surprised why the document was blocked (Read Only) when the website says it is FREE and has unlimited size when not shared.

I performed tests with the API, dividing the data into smaller parts.

  1. Data divided into 10,000 rows and one query per 10 s → document lock
  2. Data divided into 1000 rows and one query per 10 s → document lock
  3. Data divided into 200 rows and one query per 10 s → document lock

I have read the API documentation Coda API (v1) Reference Documentation and also the topics on the forum. I haven’t found an answer to the problem.

I have already written to support, I am waiting for their response by Monday (18/03)

Does anyone know what is the reason for the blockage?

(Here he gives his guesses)
I suppose there may be two reasons for this:

  1. The API has additional restrictions for FREE user, which is not mentioned in the documentation.
  2. Or Docs after all, have size limits imposed on them.

If something like this exists, information SHOULD be provided…

2

Hi @Mateusz_Kuc - Welcome to the Coda community, and I’m sorry that your first experience wasn’t a more positive one. From what I can tell you’re behavior is tripping some automatic some spam and abuse prevention that we have setup. As you can imagine, when you have a generous free tier you attract bad actors that want to misuse it. The support team should be able to work with you to correct the situation on your account.

3

Hello @Eric_Koleda. Thank you for your response. I understand that spam protection is necessary. However, I am surprised that my document is blocked even when I split 24,000 rows of data into batches of 200 rows and execute queries every 30 seconds.

Can you provide more details about the situations in which a document may be blocked? It would be helpful to know the specific restrictions I need to be aware of in the document and API to make my work easier in the future.

4

The challenge with rate limits is that the more transparent we get about them the more bad actors can evade them. I understand this is frustrating for users like yourself that are just trying to use the product for a legitimate purpose, but unfortunately I don’t think we can publicly state too much about how the system works.

I will say that in this case it wasn’t an API-specific limit, but driven more by the fundamentals of the document itself. (which is why changing the batching and rate didn’t change the outcome).