Using Strava data to create personalized reports.

Here are the steps I took to get this up-and-running. If other people start using this I’ll find a more streamlined way to replicate this, especially by removing the need for steps 4 and 5.

Create an “application” on Strava. Put “local host” (without the quotes) in the “Authorization Callback Domain” field.

Copy and paste the following link into your browser, replacing [CLIENT ID HERE] with your numeric Client ID found on your Strava application settings page.

http://www.strava.com/oauth/authorize?client_id=[CLIENT_ID_HERE]&response_type=code&redirect_uri=http://localhost/exchange_token&approval_prompt=force&scope=profile:read_all,activity:read_all

then click authorize when you visit the above link.

You will then land on a page with a url that looks like

http://localhost/exchange_token?state=&code=[A LONG CODE HERE]&scope=read,activity:read_all,profile:read_all

where instead of [A LONG CODE HERE] there is a long code. Copy and past this code–we’ll use it again in the next step.

Run get_data.py after modifying the code so that line seven reads:

copied_code = '[A LONG CODE HERE]'

where [A LONG CODE HERE] is replaced with the code copied from the url in the prior step. This will create a file called strava_tokens.json in the data file that contains access and refresh tokens so that you can pull data using the Strava API.

Encrypt strava_tokens.json so that others can’t see your tokens. To do this, run the script endur/encrypt_secret.sh but replacing $STRAVA_TOKENS_PHRASE with a password of your choosing (don’t edit this file, just make a copy. Write this password down temporarily, but then you won’t need it anymore after the next step. To run the file, open a terminal, go to the filepath of the (copied) endur/encrypt_secret.sh and run

sh encrypt_secret_copy.sh

If the file data/strava_tokens.json.gpg is created, then you succeeded in encrypting your file. Then delete encrypt_secret_copy.sh and the un-encrypted data/strava_tokens.json. You’re now done with the most laborious steps.

Under the settings page for GitHub Actions for this repository, set the following secrets:

• STRAVA_CLIENT_ID: The client ID found on your Strava application settings page
• STRAVA_CLIENT_SECRET: The client secret found on your Strava application settings page
• STRAVA_TOKENS_PHRASE: The password you chose in the previous step