Count filtered statuses from Twitter

Question

What is the easiest way to count the number of filtered statuses that come in from a twitter stream? I know I can filter statuses using the FilterQuery like so:

FilterQuery fq = new FilterQuery();
    String[] array = { "twitter" };
    fq.track(array);

    twitterStream.filter(fq);

But how would I be able count the number of statuses that come in containing the word twitter? I have tried numerous different ways which have all but failed and only led to all statuses showing up. I even tried to parse json to filter the "text" part in order to count but it became too confusing and did not work.

Answer 1

As you are already filtering for statuses that contain 'twitter' all you need to do is increment a count in the StatusListener#onStatus(Status) method, e.g.:

final AtomicInteger count = new AtomicInteger();

StatusListener listener = new StatusListener() {
    @Override
    public void onStatus(Status status) {
        count.getAndIncrement();
    }

    // omitted...
}

twitterStream.addListener(listener);
twitterStream.filter(fq);

// wait (to allow statuses to be received) then halt the steam...

System.out.println("received " + count.get() + "statuses in total");

Alternatively you could create a CountingStatusListener that provided you with the count when you were done processing the stream.

Regarding your comment:

For example I want to run the streamer and have it tell me that 7 tweets or whatever with my filtered word in them have come in since the time I ran the streamer.

You probably already know this but the streaming-api provides a real-time view of statuses flowing through Twitter (albeit a sample) so when you stop processing a stream you will miss any statuses sent between the time you stop until you start processing again.

I hope that helps.