methodshub.qmd

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title: rtoot - Collecting and Analyzing Mastodon Data
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# rtoot - Collecting and Analyzing Mastodon Data
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## Description
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An implementation of calls designed to collect and organize Mastodon data via its Application Program Interfaces (API), which can be found at the following URL: <https://docs.joinmastodon.org/>.

## Use Cases
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This package was used in [Wähner et al. (2004)](https://doi.org/10.1007/s11616-024-00855-6) for collecting Mastodon data.
Although not using this package, the data from the Mastodon API has been used in various social science publications on platform migration (e.g. [La Cava et al. 2023](https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-48200-7)) and online network formation (e.g. [La Cava, et al. 2021](https://doi.org/10.1007/s41109-021-00392-5)).

## Input Data
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This method does not require any input data.

## Output Data
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The output from this software is a [standard tibble](https://cran.r-project.org/package=tibble) of data collected from the Mastodon API.

## Hardware Requirements
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This package runs on any hardware that can run R.

## Environment Setup
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With R installed:

```r
install.packages("rtoot")
```

## How to Use
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In general, one should first conduct the authentication to obtain an access token. This can be done with the provided function `auth_setup()`. For more information, please refer to the documentation on [authentication](https://gesistsa.github.io/rtoot/articles/auth.html).
However, it is also possible to use some of functions with authentication. For example, it is possible to obtain the public timeline of a Mastodon instance, e.g. sciences.social.

```{r}
library(rtoot)
get_timeline_public(instance = "sciences.social")
```

Other functions, e.g. `get_timeline_hashtag()`, `get_account_statuses()` require authentication.
Please refer to the ["Introduction to rtoot"](https://gesistsa.github.io/rtoot/articles/rtoot.html) for a comprehensive introduction of the package.

## Technical Details
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See the official [CRAN repository](https://cran.r-project.org/package=rtoot) for further information about technical details.

## References
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1. Schoch, D., & Chan, C. H. (2023). Software presentation: Rtoot: Collecting and analyzing Mastodon data. *Mobile Media & Communication*, 11(3), 575-578. <https://doi.org/10.1177/20501579231176678>
2. Wähner, M., Deubel, A., Breuer, J., &  Weller, K. "Don't research us"—How Mastodon instance rules connect to research ethics. *Publizistik* 69, 357–380 (2024). <https://doi.org/10.1007/s11616-024-00855-6>

## Contact Details
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Maintainer: David Schoch <david@schochastics.net>
Issue Tracker: [https://github.com/gesistsa/rtoot/issues](https://github.com/gesistsa/rtoot/issues)