Researching WoW APIs
Expert guidance for discovering and understanding World of Warcraft APIs and patterns.
Related Commands
- c-research - API research workflow
CLI Commands (Use These First)
MANDATORY: Always use CLI commands before manual exploration.
| Task | Command |
|---|---|
| Search APIs (Offline) | mech call api.search -i '{"query": "*Spell*"}' |
| API Info | mech call api.info -i '{"api_name": "C_Spell.GetSpellInfo"}' |
| List by Namespace | mech call api.list -i '{"namespace": "C_Spell"}' |
| Search Icons | mech call atlas.search -i '{"query": "sword"}' |
| API Stats | mech call api.stats |
Capabilities
- API Discovery — Search 5000+ WoW APIs offline using static definitions
- Blizzard UI Research — Find patterns in Blizzard's own Lua source code
- Ace3 Patterns — Guidance on using common addon libraries (AceDB, AceEvent, etc.)
- Icon/Atlas Search — Find UI assets and textures by name
Routing Logic
| Request type | Load reference |
|---|---|
| Offline API lookup patterns | references/api-research.md |
| Blizzard UI source patterns | references/blizzard-ui.md |
| Ace3 library patterns | references/ace3-patterns.md |
| CLI Reference | ../../docs/cli-reference.md |
Quick Reference
Search WoW APIs
bash1mech call api.search -i '{"query": "GetItem*", "namespace": "C_Item"}'
Get Detailed API Info
bash1mech call api.info -i '{"api_name": "C_Spell.GetSpellInfo"}'
Search Icons
bash1mech call atlas.search -i '{"query": "sword", "limit": 10}'
Best Practices
- Search First: Use
api.searchbefore guessing API names. - Audit Blizzard: Use ripgrep on local wow-ui-source to see how Blizzard uses an API.
- Namespace Awareness: Most modern APIs are in
C_namespaces (e.g.,C_Timer,C_Spell).
