The Paren API is an outbound API based on the industry standard OCPI protocol, which makes it easy for partners and clients to connect with Paren's expansive datasets.

Paren offers a growing number of attributes that are not available in the base OCPI protocol. These attributes are explained in the API Reference documentation.

Terminology

Location

A Location is a facility with one or more Charging Stations, operated by the same operator, located in geographical proximity at a single address.

Charging station

A Charging Station is a physically distinct enclosure or stall with its own user interface, such as a screen and/or an RFID reader and/or a set of buttons. A Charging Station provides one or more EVSEs.

EVSE

An EVSE is the part that controls the power supply to a single EV for a single charging session. An EVSE may provide multiple connectors but only one of these can be active at the same time.

Connector

A Connector is a specific socket or cable available for plugging into the EV's power inlet. Paren's API can differentiate between Charging Stations that have multiple Connectors and can charge one vehicle or multiple vehicles simultaneously.

Core APIs

The Paren API consists of two main components:

Authentication

All API endpoints (except the healthcheck endpoint) require Basic Authentication.

Note: Contact API Support to obtain your API credentials.

For building the credential token, you need to:

• Combine the api key and secret key with a colon.
• The resulting string is base64 encoded.

If your username and password are key and secret, the combination is key:secret, and when base64 encoded, this becomes a2V5OnNlY3JldA==. Requests are sent with the following header:

Authorization: Basic a2V5OnNlY3JldA==

Next Steps