Active Shipping

This library is meant to interface with the web services of various shipping carriers. The goal is to abstract the features that are most frequently used into a pleasant and consistent Ruby API. Active Shipping is an extension of Active Merchant, and as such, it borrows heavily from conventions used in the latter.

We are starting out by only implementing the ability to list available shipping rates for a particular origin, destination, and set of packages. Further development could take advantage of other common features of carriers' web services such as tracking orders and printing labels.

Active Shipping is currently being used and improved in a production environment for the e-commerce application Shopify. Development is being done by James MacAulay (james@jadedpixel.com). Discussion is welcome in the Active Merchant Google Group.

Supported Shipping Carriers

• UPS
• USPS
• FedEx
• more soon!

Prerequisites

• active_support
• xml_node (right now a version of it is actually included in this library, so you don't need to worry about it yet)
• mocha for the tests

Download & Installation

Currently this library is available on GitHub:

http://github.com/Shopify/active_shipping

You will need to get Git if you don't have it. Then:

> git clone git://github.com/Shopify/active_shipping.git

(That URL is case-sensitive, so watch out.)

Active Shipping includes an init.rb file. This means that Rails will automatically load it on startup. Check out git-archive for exporting the file tree from your repository to your vendor directory.

Gem and tarball forthcoming on rubyforge.

Sample Usage

require 'active_shipping'
include ActiveMerchant::Shipping

# Package up a poster and a Wii for your nephew.
packages = [
  Package.new(  100,                        # 100 grams
                [93,10],                    # 93 cm long, 10 cm diameter
                :cylinder => true),         # cylinders have different volume calculations

  Package.new(  (7.5 * 16),                 # 7.5 lbs, times 16 oz/lb.
                [15, 10, 4.5],              # 15x10x4.5 inches
                :units => :imperial)        # not grams, not centimetres
]

# You live in Beverly Hills, he lives in Ottawa
origin = Location.new(      :country => 'US',
                            :state => 'CA',
                            :city => 'Beverly Hills',
                            :zip => '90210')

destination = Location.new( :country => 'CA',
                            :province => 'ON',
                            :city => 'Ottawa',
                            :postal_code => 'K1P 1J1')

# Find out how much it'll be.
ups = UPS.new(:login => 'auntjudy', :password => 'secret', :key => 'xml-access-key')
response = ups.find_rates(origin, destination, packages)

ups_rates = response.rates.sort_by(&:price).collect {|rate| [rate.service_name, rate.price]}
# => [["UPS Standard", 3936],
#     ["UPS Worldwide Expedited", 8682],
#     ["UPS Saver", 9348],
#     ["UPS Express", 9702],
#     ["UPS Worldwide Express Plus", 14502]]

# Check out USPS for comparison...
usps = USPS.new(:login => 'developer-key')
response = usps.find_rates(origin, destination, packages)

usps_rates = response.rates.sort_by(&:price).collect {|rate| [rate.service_name, rate.price]}
# => [["USPS Priority Mail International", 4110],
#     ["USPS Express Mail International (EMS)", 5750],
#     ["USPS Global Express Guaranteed Non-Document Non-Rectangular", 9400],
#     ["USPS GXG Envelopes", 9400],
#     ["USPS Global Express Guaranteed Non-Document Rectangular", 9400],
#     ["USPS Global Express Guaranteed", 9400]]

# FedEx
fdx = FedEx.new(:login => 'Your 9-digit FedEx Account #', :password => 'Your Meter Number')
response = fdx.find_rates(origin, destination, packages, :test => true)
response.rates.sort_by(&:price).collect {|rate| [rate.service_name, rate.price]}
# => [["FedEx Ground", 977], 
# ["FedEx Ground Home Delivery", 1388], 
# ["FedEx Express Saver", 2477], 
# ["FedEx 2 Day", 2718], 
# ["FedEx Standard Overnight", 4978], 
# ["FedEx Priority Overnight", 8636], 
# ["FedEx First Overnight", 12306]]

# FedEx Tracking
fdx = FedEx.new(:login => '999999999', :password => '7777777')
tracking_info = fdx.find_tracking_info('tracking number here', :carrier_code => 'fedex_ground') # Ground package

tracking_info.shipment_events.each do |event|
  puts "#{event.name} at #{event.location.city}, #{event.location.state} on #{event.time}. #{event.message}"
end
# => Package information transmitted to FedEx at NASHVILLE LOCAL, TN on Thu Oct 23 00:00:00 UTC 2008. 
# Picked up by FedEx at NASHVILLE LOCAL, TN on Thu Oct 23 17:30:00 UTC 2008. 
# Scanned at FedEx sort facility at NASHVILLE, TN on Thu Oct 23 18:50:00 UTC 2008. 
# Departed FedEx sort facility at NASHVILLE, TN on Thu Oct 23 22:33:00 UTC 2008. 
# Arrived at FedEx sort facility at KNOXVILLE, TN on Fri Oct 24 02:45:00 UTC 2008. 
# Scanned at FedEx sort facility at KNOXVILLE, TN on Fri Oct 24 05:56:00 UTC 2008. 
# Delivered at Knoxville, TN on Fri Oct 24 16:45:00 UTC 2008. Signed for by: T.BAKER

tracking_info = fdx.find_tracking_info('tracking number here', :carrier_code => 'fedex_express') # Express package

tracking_info.shipment_events.each do |event|
  puts "#{event.name} at #{event.location.city}, #{event.location.state} on #{event.time}. #{event.message}"
end
# => Picked up by FedEx at NASHVILLE, TN on Wed Dec 03 16:46:00 UTC 2008. 
# Package status at MISSISSAUGA, ON on Wed Dec 03 18:00:00 UTC 2008. 
# Left FedEx Origin Location at NASHVILLE, TN on Wed Dec 03 20:27:00 UTC 2008. 
# Arrived at FedEx Ramp at NASHVILLE, TN on Wed Dec 03 20:43:00 UTC 2008. 
# Left FedEx Ramp at NASHVILLE, TN on Wed Dec 03 22:30:00 UTC 2008. 
# Arrived at Sort Facility at INDIANAPOLIS, IN on Thu Dec 04 00:31:00 UTC 2008. 
# Left FedEx Sort Facility at INDIANAPOLIS, IN on Thu Dec 04 01:14:00 UTC 2008. 
# Left FedEx Sort Facility at INDIANAPOLIS, IN on Thu Dec 04 04:48:00 UTC 2008. 
# Arrived at FedEx Ramp at MISSISSAUGA, ON on Thu Dec 04 06:26:00 UTC 2008. 
# Package status at MISSISSAUGA, ON on Thu Dec 04 07:03:00 UTC 2008. 
# Left FedEx Ramp at MISSISSAUGA, ON on Thu Dec 04 07:37:00 UTC 2008. 
# Arrived at FedEx Destination Location at TORONTO, ON on Thu Dec 04 08:42:00 UTC 2008. 
# On FedEx vehicle for delivery at TORONTO, ON on Thu Dec 04 09:04:00 UTC 2008. 
# Delivered to Non-FedEx clearance broker at TORONTO, ON on Thu Dec 04 10:15:00 UTC 2008.

TODO

• proper documentation
• proper offline testing for carriers in addition to the remote tests
• package into a gem
• carrier code template generator
• more carriers
• integrate with ActiveMerchant
• support more features for existing carriers
• bin-packing algorithm (preferably implemented in ruby)
• order tracking
• label printing

Contributing

Yes, please! Take a look at the tests and the implementation of the Carrier class to see how the basics work. At some point soon there will be a carrier template generator along the lines of the gateway generator included in Active Merchant, but carrier.rb outlines most of what's necessary. The other main classes that would be good to familiarize yourself with are Location, Package, and Response.

The nicest way to submit changes would be to set up a GitHub account and fork this project, then initiate a pull request when you want your changes looked at. You can also make a patch (preferably with git-diff) and email to james@jadedpixel.com.

Contributors

• James MacAulay (http://jmacaulay.net)
• Tobias Luetke (http://blog.leetsoft.com)
• Cody Fauser (http://codyfauser.com)
• Jimmy Baker (http://jimmyville.com/)

Legal Mumbo Jumbo

Unless otherwise noted in specific files, all code in the Active Shipping project is under the copyright and license described in the included MIT-LICENSE file.