Overview
This node integrates with NASA's public API to retrieve the Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD). It fetches detailed information about the daily featured astronomical image, including metadata such as title, explanation, and media type. This node is useful for applications that want to display or process NASA’s daily astronomy images automatically, such as educational platforms, space-related blogs, or digital signage.
A practical example would be a workflow that runs daily to get the latest APOD and posts it to a social media channel or updates a website’s astronomy section.
Properties
| Name | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Additional Fields | Optional extra parameters to customize the request. Currently supports: |
| - Date | Specify a particular date to retrieve the APOD for that day instead of today. The date must be in ISO format (YYYY-MM-DD). |
Output
The node outputs JSON data representing the Astronomy Picture of the Day. The structure typically includes fields such as:
date: The date of the APOD.explanation: A description of the image.media_type: Type of media returned (e.g., image or video).title: Title of the APOD.url: URL to the image or video.- Other metadata fields provided by NASA’s APOD API.
No binary data output is produced by this node.
Dependencies
- Requires access to NASA’s public API endpoint at
https://api.nasa.gov/planetary/apod. - Optionally can use an API key credential for NASA’s API if configured in n8n, but it is not mandatory.
- No additional external dependencies are required.
Troubleshooting
Common issues:
- If no data is returned, verify the date parameter is correctly formatted (ISO 8601) and within the valid range supported by NASA’s APOD API.
- Network connectivity issues may prevent reaching NASA’s API endpoint.
- Rate limiting by NASA’s API if too many requests are made in a short time without an API key.
Error messages:
- HTTP 400 errors often indicate invalid query parameters, such as an incorrectly formatted date.
- HTTP 403 or 401 errors suggest missing or invalid API authentication if an API key is required.
To resolve these, ensure the date is valid, check network connectivity, and configure an API key credential if needed.