pvsR (version 0.3)

CandidateBio.getDetailedBio: Get a candidate's detailed biographical information

Description

This function is a wrapper for the CandidateBio.getDetailedBio() method of the PVS API CandidateBio class which grabs the detailed biographical information for each candidate. The function sends a request with this method to the PVS API for all candidate IDs given as a function input, extracts the XML values from the returned XML file(s) and returns them arranged in one data frame.

Usage

CandidateBio.getDetailedBio(candidateId)

Arguments

candidateId

a character string or list of character strings with the candidate ID(s) (see references for details)

Value

• A list with several data frames containing the elements of CandidateBio.getBio(), and expands upon: bio.candidate.education.degree, bio.candidate.education.field, bio.candidate.education.school, bio.candidate.education.span, bio.candidate.education.gpa, bio.candidate.education.fullText, bio.candidate.profession.title, bio.candidate.profession.organization, bio.candidate.profession.span, bio.candidate.profession.special, bio.candidate.profession.district, bio.candidate.profession.fullText, bio.candidate.political.title, bio.candidate.political.organization, bio.candidate.political.span, bio.candidate.political.special, bio.candidate.political.district, bio.candidate.political.fullText, bio.candidate.congMembership.title, bio.candidate.congMembership.organization, bio.candidate.congMembership.span, bio.candidate.congMembership.special, bio.candidate.congMembership.district, bio.candidate.congMembership.fullText, bio.candidate.orgMembership.title, bio.candidate.orgMembership.organization, bio.candidate.orgMembership.span, bio.candidate.orgMembership.special, bio.candidate.orgMembership.district, bio.candidate.orgMembership.fullText.

References

http://api.votesmart.org/docs/CandidateBio.html Use Candidates.getByOfficeState(), Candidates.getByOfficeTypeState(), Candidates.getByLastname(), Candidates.getByLevenshtein(), Candidates.getByElection(), Candidates.getByDistrict() or Candidates.getByZip() to get a list of candidate IDs.

Examples

# First, make sure your personal PVS API key is saved as character string in the pvs.key variable:
pvs.key <- "yourkey"
# get main biographical data on Barack Obama and Mitt Romney
bio <- CandidateBio.getDetailedBio(list(9490,21942))
head(bio$profession)
head(bio$orgMembership)