Fifty-Three Endpoints: How to Automate Your Entire Show

There is a moment in every production team's evolution when they stop thinking about individual tools and start thinking about systems. The timer is no longer just a timer. It is a node in a network of interconnected production systems that need to communicate, coordinate, and respond to each other in real time. In broadcast facilities, this systems thinking is second nature: the Master Control Room automation system talks to the playout server, which talks to the graphics engine, which talks to the switcher, all through well defined protocols and APIs. When your production reaches that level of integration, the API is what determines whether a tool can participate in the network or whether it remains an isolated island. Timers Studio exposes fifty three REST API endpoints documented against the OpenAPI 3.1 specification. This is not a token gesture toward integration. It is a comprehensive control surface that exposes every meaningful parameter and action in the system to programmatic access, much like how a broadcast automation system exposes every playout channel and graphic layer to external control [Try the zero drift experience]. The API is organized around four security scopes. READ provides access to all monitoring and state retrieval endpoints: current timer values, rundown configuration, theme settings, device lists, and session metadata. TRANSPORT adds control over timer playback: start, pause, stop, reset, next, previous, rewind, and time adjustments. MUTATION adds the ability to modify data: create and delete timers, update segment durations and speaker information, change themes, send messages, and modify design parameters. ADMIN provides full access including session management, API key administration, device control, and configuration export. Each API key is assigned specific scopes at creation time. This granularity matters for production environments where different systems need different levels of access, following the same principle of least privilege that broadcast facilities apply to their automation credentials. A monitoring dashboard should have READ access only. A Companion module needs READ and TRANSPORT. An automation platform like n8n that modifies the rundown needs READ, TRANSPORT, and MUTATION. Only the production team's administrative tools need ADMIN scope. Authentication uses Bearer tokens generated in the API and Integrations panel of the dashboard, where you can also view last used timestamps, source IP addresses, and revoke tokens that are no longer needed. You can test this right now [Launch your first studio]. The real time monitoring capability is built on Server Sent Events, which function like a broadcast tally bus that carries state information to every connected system. Instead of polling the API to detect state changes, a client opens an SSE connection and receives events as they occur. Timer started, timer paused, timer reset, message sent, theme changed, device connected, device disconnected: every state transition generates an SSE event with a structured JSON payload. Any system that can consume an HTTP event stream can monitor Timers Studio state in real time. Three real world automation scenarios illustrate the API's practical value. The first scenario uses n8n, an open source workflow automation platform. A production team manages a weekly live show with a fixed format: opening, three interview segments, and a closing. They want the show rundown created automatically every week from a Google Sheet that the producer updates with guest names and segment durations. An n8n workflow triggers every Monday morning, reads the Google Sheet, makes API calls to create the studio session, adds timers with the correct durations and titles, assigns speaker names, and sends the studio URL to the production team via Slack. By the time the producer finishes their morning coffee, the week's cue list is programmed and ready for rehearsal. The second scenario integrates with vMix for automated camera switching synchronized to the timer rundown. A lightweight script monitors the Timers Studio SSE stream for timer transition events. When it detects a transition, it sends the corresponding input switch command to vMix's TCP API. The result is automated camera switching without any operator intervention, the same kind of automation that broadcast facilities achieve with expensive MOS integration [See it in action]. The third scenario uses OBS for stream overlays. A content creator wants their stream overlay to display the current timer value, speaker name, and segment title. An OBS browser source connects to the Timers Studio SSE stream and renders the current state as a transparent overlay. The overlay updates in real time as timers progress, and it automatically shows the correct speaker name and segment title as the rundown advances. Beyond these scenarios, the API enables sophisticated automation patterns. Conditional logic: if a segment exceeds its duration by more than two minutes, automatically send a wrap up message to the speaker's confidence monitor. Scheduled operations: start the opening timer at exactly 9:00 AM without manual intervention. Data collection: log every timer transition with timestamps to a database for post show analysis. External triggers: start a timer when a webhook arrives from a ticketing system indicating that check in is complete. The API documentation is interactive, with each endpoint including a description, parameter definitions, request body schemas, and response examples. You can test endpoints directly from the documentation page using your API key. The OpenAPI 3.1 spec file is available for download, meaning you can import it into Postman, Insomnia, or any API client that supports the format. Rate limits are configured per scope to prevent abuse without constraining legitimate production use. READ operations allow 600 requests per minute. TRANSPORT operations allow 300 requests per minute. These limits support real time monitoring and automated control while protecting the system. For production teams ready to build integrated, automated show control systems, the API is the foundation. Every feature available in the Studio interface is available through the API. What the human operator does with clicks and keystrokes, your automation platform can do with HTTP requests. Generate your first API key and explore the endpoints [choose the right tier for your production].