Kanboard Documentation

API Reference

Introduction

User and application API

There are two types of API access:

Application API

  • Access to the API with the user “jsonrpc” and the token available on the settings page
  • Access to all procedures
  • No permission checked
  • There is no user session on the server
  • No access to procedures that starts with “My…” (example: “getMe” or “getMyProjects”)
  • Example of possible clients: tools to migrate/import data, create tasks from another system, etc…

User API

  • Access to the API with the user credentials (username and password)
  • You can also generate a personal access token instead of your password
  • Application role and project permissions are checked for each procedure
  • A user session is created on the server
  • Example of possible clients: native mobile/desktop application, command line utility, etc…

Security

  • Always use HTTPS with a valid certificate (avoid clear text communication)
  • If you develop a mobile application, it's your responsability to store securely the user credentials on the device
  • After 3 authentication failures on the user API, the end-user have to unlock his account by using the login form
Since Kanboard v1.2.8, people with two-factor authentication enabled must use API keys.

Protocol

Kanboard uses the protocol Json-RPC to interact with external programs.

JSON-RPC is a remote procedure call protocol encoded in JSON. Almost the same thing as XML-RPC but with the JSON format.

We use the version 2 of the protocol. You must call the API with a POST HTTP request.

Kanboard support batch requests, so you can make multiple API calls in a single HTTP request. It’s particularly useful for mobile clients with higher network latency.

API Procedures