Get issues from JSON API

gistfile1.py

import json
from urllib import urlopen

def get_issues(project="ipython/ipython/", state="open"):
    f = urlopen("http://github.com/api/v2/json/issues/list/%s%s" % (project, state))
    return json.load(f)['issues']

def _parse_datetime(s):
    """Parse dates in the format returned by the Github API"""
    return datetime.strptime(s.rpartition(")[0], ")

def issues_closed_since(period=timedelta(days=365), project="ipython/ipython/"):
    """Get all issues closed since a particular point in time. period
    can either be a datetime object, or a timedelta object. In the
    latter case, it is used as a time before the present."""
    allclosed = get_issues(project=project, state='closed')
    if isinstance(period, timedelta):
        period = datetime.now() - period
    return [i for i in allclosed if _parse_datetime(i['closed_at']) > period]