Can the opensocial API remotely search for users in orkut etc.?

Question

Does anyone know if (and how) I can build an application (Java/Ruby/whatever) doing REST or RPC calls to a social network like Orkut (using opensocial) to search for a user by name or email address? So far I know that I can list all friends for a particular user ID, but I want to search among all users. Would I need to code it as an app/gadget running inside the google sandbox or is there a way to get a list of matching user ID via REST? So far I got this one to work: http://code.google.com/p/opensocial-ruby-client/wiki/GettingStarted. But with this API and the gadget linked there I only get people that are already linked to me...

Thanks for answers, Martin

Answer 1

No, you can't do that. At least, OpenSocial doesn't have spec like that. In addition, SNS normally have privacy policy which disables developers to poke around users who hasn't installed your app.

Think OpenSocial API access to private information is quite limited.