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name: parser-and-media description: "Parse NASA APOD JSON with the standalone helper, inspect optional media fields, and safely download or convert an explicitly requested asset." disable-model-invocation: true metadata: disco-role: operating license: Apache 2.0

Parser and media

Use this route when the input is already NASA APOD JSON or when a caller has explicitly asked for one media asset. Start with the bundled offline inspector; then use the downloader or Pillow converter only when the corresponding operation is requested. The parser helper is a convenience module, not a Flask endpoint client and not the HTML scraper.

• API signatures and prerequisites
• Response shapes and optional keys
• Safe inspection, download, and conversion workflows
• Parser/media troubleshooting
• For Flask routes, query parameters, or server startup, use api-service.
• For uv, Gunicorn, Docker, or bounded load operations, use deployment-and-operations.
• For shared service failures, see the root troubleshooting route.

Route rules

1. If the value is a JSON object or array from NASA's REST APOD API, inspect it with scripts/inspect_apod_response.py or use the exact accessors below.
2. If a required key is absent, diagnose the shape before indexing. hdurl, copyright, and thumbnail_url are optional in real responses.
3. Download only after the caller supplies an intended URL and destination. Prefer scripts/download_apod_asset.py; it requires an output directory, refuses accidental replacement, and makes network use visible.
4. Convert only a local image with scripts/convert_apod_image.py; it requires an explicit PNG destination and refuses overwrite unless explicitly enabled.
5. A video URL is not an image. Do not send it to Pillow. Use thumbnail_url only when the response supplies it (normally after the API request asks for thumbnails), and treat thumbnail availability as a caveat.

The source helper retains the historical misspelling get_explaination; do not silently rename it when reproducing existing caller code. Detailed source compatibility notes and safer adaptations are in the references.