How to construct a SoQL where clause on a text column using <= operation?

I get an Unrecognized arguments error when trying to apply a <= operation on a SoQL text field. Any help is very much appreciated.

I have tried to apply several different filters on this text field but only the = operation works. When I try any other I get an Unrecognized arguments error.

For example: https://data.sfgov.org/resource/bbb8-hzi6.json?start24=10:00 (works fine) but https://data.sfgov.org/resource/bbb8-hzi6.json?start24<=10:00 (fails)

According to the documentation here https://dev.socrata.com/docs/datatypes/text.html#, <= evaluates strings that are alphanumerically before or equal. I would expect these operations to work on text strings as stated.

The Socrata API uses regular GET parameters. In your example, you're performing simple filtering, which allows you to just perform exact matches.

https://data.sfgov.org/resource/bbb8-hzi6.json?start24=10:00 

• start24=10:00 has the GET parameter start24 with a value of 10:00

However, in your example with <=. That means something entirely different in the URL world; this means:

• start24<=10:00 has the GET parameter start24< with a value of 10:00.

Since you can't use any other operators such as <=, Socrata uses SoQL queries where special keywords start with $; e.g. $where.

https://data.sfgov.org/resource/bbb8-hzi6.json?$where=start24<="10:00"

Now this gets translated to:

• $where=start24<="10:00" has the GET parameter $where with a value of start24<="10:00"

Now, this Socrata can handle and will return your results.