Before launching ATDW content on your live site, it’s essential to thoroughly test your integration. Our sandbox environment is designed to help you validate functionality, troubleshoot issues, and ensure a seamless experience for travellers - without any risk to live data or services.
What Is the Sandbox Environment?
The sandbox is a safe, isolated environment that replicates the real ATDW API. It allows you to:
Experiment with API calls using test data
Validate your integration’s functionality and error handling
Simulate real-world scenarios, without impacting production systems or actual tourism profiles
Why Test in the Sandbox?
Testing in the sandbox helps you:
Identify and resolve issues before going live
Ensure your integration is robust, reliable, and ready for real travellers
Minimise risk by catching edge cases and unexpected behaviours early
How to Use the Sandbox Environment
Request Access: Contact us to obtain sandbox credentials, including a sandbox-specific API key. These credentials are separate from your live (production) API details.
Access the Sandbox API Endpoint: Use the dedicated sandbox URL provided in our API Guide. This ensures your requests are routed to the test environment, not the live system.
Define Your Test Scenarios: Test scenarios are designed to simulate real-world usage of the API and ensure that your application can handle various conditions and responses. (See: Creating & running test scenarios, below)
Perform API Calls: With your sandbox credentials, you can make any API call - search, retrieve product details, filter by location or category, and more. The sandbox will return simulated responses, allowing you to test all scenarios safely.
Validate and Refine: Check that your application:
- Returns the correct data in the expected format (JSON or XML)
- Handles errors and edge cases gracefully
- Accurately filters, sorts, and displays ATDW contentTransition to Production
Once you’ve completed your tests and are confident in your integration, switch to your production API key and update your endpoints to point to the live environment.
Creating & running test scenarios
To ensure your integration is robust, consider the following scenarios to test:
Basic Data Retrieval: Test the retrieval of tourism products such as accommodations, attractions, and events. Ensure the API returns the expected data in the correct format (JSON or XML).
Search Functionality: Implement full-text search scenarios to verify that your application can accurately find products based on keywords. Test geospatial and polygon searches to ensure the correct listings are returned based on location-based queries.
Filtering and Sorting: Run tests to verify that your application can filter results by categories, classifications (such as hotels, tours), and attributes (such as Wi-Fi or pool). Test sorting features to ensure results are returned in the correct order based on criteria like relevance, rating, or proximity.
Error Handling: Simulate common errors such as invalid API keys, incorrect parameters, or empty searches to ensure your application gracefully handles these scenarios. Verify that the correct error messages are returned and that your application responds appropriately.
Paging and Ordering: Test scenarios where results are paginated to ensure that your application correctly handles multiple pages of data. Validate the ordering of results and ensure that pagination functions smoothly across different data sets.
Multilingual Data Retrieval: If your application supports multiple languages, test the retrieval of data in simplified and traditional Chinese to ensure accurate representation and proper encoding.
Testing Best Practices
Define clear objectives: Know what you want to test - functionality, performance, security, or all three.
Prioritise critical endpoints: Focus on high-impact features like search, booking, and contact actions.
Document your test cases: Keep a checklist to track which scenarios have been validated.
Refer to the API Guide: For endpoint details, parameters, and example responses.
Need Assistance?
We're here to support you throughout testing and launch. If you have questions about the sandbox environment or need help defining your test scenarios, please reach out.