harvard-artifacts-collection-etl-analytics

Build ETL pipelines and analytics dashboards for Harvard Art Museums API data using Python, SQL, and Streamlit

INSTALLATION
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SKILL.md

Harvard Artifacts Collection ETL Analytics

Skill by ara.so — Data Skills collection.

This project provides a complete data engineering and analytics solution for the Harvard Art Museums API. It demonstrates ETL pipeline construction, relational database design, SQL analytics, and interactive visualization using Streamlit. The application extracts artifact metadata, transforms nested JSON into structured tables, loads data into SQL databases, and provides 20+ analytical queries with auto-generated visualizations.

Installation

# Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/Manali0711/Harvard-Artifacts-Collection-Data-Engineering-Analytics-App.git

cd Harvard-Artifacts-Collection-Data-Engineering-Analytics-App

# Install dependencies

pip install -r requirements.txt

Set up environment variables

export HARVARD_API_KEY="your_api_key_here"

export DB_HOST="your_database_host"

export DB_USER="your_database_user"

export DB_PASSWORD="your_database_password"

export DB_NAME="your_database_name"

## Project Architecture

**API → ETL → SQL → Analytics → Visualization**

- **Data Source**: Harvard Art Museums API

- **ETL Engine**: Python (requests, pandas)

- **Database**: MySQL / TiDB Cloud

- **Visualization**: Streamlit + Plotly

## Getting Harvard API Key

1. Visit [Harvard Art Museums API](https://www.harvardartmuseums.org/collections/api)

2. Register for a free API key

3. Store in environment variable: `HARVARD_API_KEY`

## Core Components

### 1. API Data Collection

Fetch artifacts with pagination and rate limiting:

import requests

import time

import os

def fetch_artifacts(api_key, page=1, size=100):

"""Fetch artifacts from Harvard Art Museums API with pagination"""

base_url = "https://api.harvardartmuseums.org/object"

params = {

'apikey': api_key,

'page': page,

'size': size,

'hasimage': 1 # Only artifacts with images

}

response = requests.get(base_url, params=params)

if response.status_code == 200:

return response.json()

else:

raise Exception(f"API Error: {response.status_code}")

Collect multiple pages with rate limiting

def collect_artifacts(num_pages=10):

api_key = os.getenv('HARVARD_API_KEY')

all_artifacts = []

for page in range(1, num_pages + 1):

print(f"Fetching page {page}...")

data = fetch_artifacts(api_key, page=page)

all_artifacts.extend(data.get('records', []))

time.sleep(1) # Rate limiting

return all_artifacts


### 2. ETL Pipeline

Transform nested JSON into relational tables:

import pandas as pd

import json

def extract_artifact_metadata(artifacts):

"""Extract main artifact metadata"""

metadata = []

for artifact in artifacts:

metadata.append({

'objectid': artifact.get('objectid'),

'title': artifact.get('title'),

'culture': artifact.get('culture'),

'period': artifact.get('period'),

'century': artifact.get('century'),

'classification': artifact.get('classification'),

'department': artifact.get('department'),

'division': artifact.get('division'),

'dated': artifact.get('dated'),

'description': artifact.get('description'),

'technique': artifact.get('technique'),

'medium': artifact.get('medium'),

'dimensions': artifact.get('dimensions'),

'creditline': artifact.get('creditline'),

'accessionyear': artifact.get('accessionyear')

})

return pd.DataFrame(metadata)

def extract_artifact_media(artifacts):

"""Extract media/image data"""

media = []

for artifact in artifacts:

objectid = artifact.get('objectid')

images = artifact.get('images', [])

for img in images:

media.append({

'objectid': objectid,

'imageid': img.get('imageid'),

'baseimageurl': img.get('baseimageurl'),

'iiifbaseuri': img.get('iiifbaseuri'),

'height': img.get('height'),

'width': img.get('width'),

'format': img.get('format')

})

return pd.DataFrame(media)

def extract_artifact_colors(artifacts):

"""Extract color palette data"""

colors = []

for artifact in artifacts:

objectid = artifact.get('objectid')

color_data = artifact.get('colors', [])

for color in color_data:

colors.append({

'objectid': objectid,

'color': color.get('color'),

'spectrum': color.get('spectrum'),

'hue': color.get('hue'),

'percent': color.get('percent')

})

return pd.DataFrame(colors)

Complete ETL process

def run_etl():

print("Starting ETL pipeline...")

# Extract

artifacts = collect_artifacts(num_pages=5)

# Transform

df_metadata = extract_artifact_metadata(artifacts)

df_media = extract_artifact_media(artifacts)

df_colors = extract_artifact_colors(artifacts)

print(f"Extracted {len(df_metadata)} artifacts")

print(f"Extracted {len(df_media)} media records")

print(f"Extracted {len(df_colors)} color records")

return df_metadata, df_media, df_colors


### 3. Database Schema and Loading

import mysql.connector

from mysql.connector import Error

import os

def get_db_connection():

"""Create database connection"""

return mysql.connector.connect(

host=os.getenv('DB_HOST'),

user=os.getenv('DB_USER'),

password=os.getenv('DB_PASSWORD'),

database=os.getenv('DB_NAME')

)

def create_tables(connection):

"""Create database schema"""

cursor = connection.cursor()

# Artifact metadata table

cursor.execute("""

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS artifactmetadata (

objectid INT PRIMARY KEY,

title TEXT,

culture VARCHAR(255),

period VARCHAR(255),

century VARCHAR(100),

classification VARCHAR(255),

department VARCHAR(255),

division VARCHAR(255),

dated VARCHAR(255),

description TEXT,

technique TEXT,

medium TEXT,

dimensions TEXT,

creditline TEXT,

accessionyear INT

)

""")

# Artifact media table

cursor.execute("""

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS artifactmedia (

id INT AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,

objectid INT,

imageid INT,

baseimageurl TEXT,

iiifbaseuri TEXT,

height INT,

width INT,

format VARCHAR(50),

FOREIGN KEY (objectid) REFERENCES artifactmetadata(objectid)

)

""")

# Artifact colors table

cursor.execute("""

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS artifactcolors (

id INT AUTO_INCREMENT PRIMARY KEY,

objectid INT,

color VARCHAR(100),

spectrum VARCHAR(100),

hue VARCHAR(100),

percent FLOAT,

FOREIGN KEY (objectid) REFERENCES artifactmetadata(objectid)

)

""")

connection.commit()

print("Tables created successfully")

def load_dataframe_to_sql(df, table_name, connection):

"""Batch insert dataframe into SQL table"""

cursor = connection.cursor()

# Prepare column names and placeholders

columns = ', '.join(df.columns)

placeholders = ', '.join(['%s'] * len(df.columns))

insert_query = f"INSERT INTO {table_name} ({columns}) VALUES ({placeholders})"

# Convert dataframe to list of tuples

data = [tuple(x) for x in df.to_numpy()]

# Batch insert

cursor.executemany(insert_query, data)

connection.commit()

print(f"Loaded {len(df)} records into {table_name}")

Complete load process

def load_to_database(df_metadata, df_media, df_colors):

connection = get_db_connection()

create_tables(connection)

load_dataframe_to_sql(df_metadata, 'artifactmetadata', connection)

load_dataframe_to_sql(df_media, 'artifactmedia', connection)

load_dataframe_to_sql(df_colors, 'artifactcolors', connection)

connection.close()

print("Data loading complete!")


### 4. SQL Analytics Queries

def execute_query(query, connection):

"""Execute SQL query and return results as DataFrame"""

return pd.read_sql(query, connection)

Sample analytical queries

ANALYTICS_QUERIES = {

"Artifacts by Culture": """

SELECT culture, COUNT(*) as artifact_count

FROM artifactmetadata

WHERE culture IS NOT NULL

GROUP BY culture

ORDER BY artifact_count DESC

LIMIT 10

""",

"Artifacts by Century": """

SELECT century, COUNT(*) as count

FROM artifactmetadata

WHERE century IS NOT NULL

GROUP BY century

ORDER BY count DESC

""",

"Top Departments": """

SELECT department, COUNT(*) as total_artifacts

FROM artifactmetadata

WHERE department IS NOT NULL

GROUP BY department

ORDER BY total_artifacts DESC

LIMIT 10

""",

"Media Availability": """

SELECT

CASE WHEN m.objectid IS NOT NULL THEN 'Has Media' ELSE 'No Media' END as media_status,

COUNT(*) as count

FROM artifactmetadata a

LEFT JOIN artifactmedia m ON a.objectid = m.objectid

GROUP BY media_status

""",

"Color Distribution": """

SELECT color, COUNT(*) as frequency, AVG(percent) as avg_percent

FROM artifactcolors

GROUP BY color

ORDER BY frequency DESC

LIMIT 15

""",

"Artifacts by Classification": """

SELECT classification, COUNT(*) as count

FROM artifactmetadata

WHERE classification IS NOT NULL

GROUP BY classification

ORDER BY count DESC

LIMIT 10

""",

"Average Image Dimensions": """

SELECT

AVG(height) as avg_height,

AVG(width) as avg_width,

COUNT(*) as total_images

FROM artifactmedia

"""

}


### 5. Streamlit Dashboard

import streamlit as st

import plotly.express as px

def main():

st.title("🏛️ Harvard Art Museums Analytics Dashboard")

st.markdown("### ETL Pipeline & Analytics Application")

# Sidebar configuration

st.sidebar.header("Configuration")

# ETL Section

st.header("📊 ETL Pipeline")

if st.button("Run ETL Pipeline"):

with st.spinner("Running ETL..."):

df_metadata, df_media, df_colors = run_etl()

load_to_database(df_metadata, df_media, df_colors)

st.success("ETL pipeline completed successfully!")

# Analytics Section

st.header("📈 Analytics Queries")

query_name = st.selectbox("Select Query", list(ANALYTICS_QUERIES.keys()))

if st.button("Execute Query"):

connection = get_db_connection()

query = ANALYTICS_QUERIES[query_name]

with st.spinner("Executing query..."):

results = execute_query(query, connection)

st.subheader("Query Results")

st.dataframe(results)

# Auto-generate visualization

if len(results.columns) >= 2:

fig = px.bar(

results,

x=results.columns[0],

y=results.columns[1],

title=query_name

)

st.plotly_chart(fig)

connection.close()

if __name__ == "__main__":

main()


## Running the Application

Start Streamlit dashboard

streamlit run app.py

Access at http://localhost:8501


## Common Patterns

### Incremental Data Loading

def get_max_objectid(connection):

"""Get the latest objectid to avoid duplicates"""

cursor = connection.cursor()

cursor.execute("SELECT MAX(objectid) FROM artifactmetadata")

result = cursor.fetchone()[0]

return result if result else 0

def incremental_etl():

"""Only fetch new artifacts"""

connection = get_db_connection()

max_id = get_max_objectid(connection)

# Fetch artifacts with objectid > max_id

# ... implement filtering logic

connection.close()


### Error Handling and Logging

import logging

logging.basicConfig(level=logging.INFO)

logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)

def safe_etl():

"""ETL with error handling"""

try:

artifacts = collect_artifacts(num_pages=5)

df_metadata, df_media, df_colors = run_etl()

load_to_database(df_metadata, df_media, df_colors)

logger.info("ETL completed successfully")

except Exception as e:

logger.error(f"ETL failed: {str(e)}")

raise

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