Building an API Product: Design, implement, and release API products that meet user needs 9781837630448

Table of contents :
Building an API Product
Contributors
About the author
About the reviewers
Preface
Who this book is for
What this book covers
Download the example code files
Conventions used
Get in touch
Share Your Thoughts
Download a free PDF copy of this book
Part 1:The API Product
1
What Are APIs?
The different types of APIs
Local APIs
Remote APIs
The history of APIs
Unix
Network APIs
The web
Available technologies and protocols
Communication protocols
Implementation technologies
Tools
Summary
2
API User Experience
Who uses APIs?
Industries
Personas
Developer experience
Second-degree user experience
API friction
Summary
3
API-as-a-Product
Business value
Monetization models
The freemium model
Tiered model
PAYG model
Support and documentation
Security
Logging and monitoring
Rate-limiting
Authentication and authorization
Summary
4
API Life Cycle
Design
Implementation
Release
Maintenance
Summary
Part 2:Designing an API Product
5
Elements of API Product Design
Technical requirements
Ideation
Strategy
Definition
Validation
Specification
Summary
6
Identifying an API Strategy
The meaning of strategy
Stakeholders
Business objectives
Personas
Behaviors
Summary
7
Defining and Validating an API Design
Technical requirements
API capabilities
Use case analysis
Functional requirements
Integration needs
Security and access control
Compliance with laws and regulations
Documentation
API mock
Prototyping an API integration with a UI
Design iterations
Summary
8
Specifying an API
Technical requirements
Choosing the type of API to build
Different types of APIs
API specification formats
OpenAPI
IDL (protocol buffers)
GraphQL
WSDL
AsyncAPI
Creating a machine-readable API definition
Following API governance rules
API design
API life cycle management
Summary
Part 3:Implementing an API Product
9
Development Techniques
Technical requirements
Prototyping an API
Choosing a programming language and framework
Factors to consider
Popular languages for building APIs
Node.js
Python
Ruby
Java
Go
Rust
Comparing programming languages
Generating server code from a specification
Generating server code using Postman
Generating server code using OpenAPI Generator
Summary
10
API Security
What is API security?
Security testing
Authentication
API key management
Token management
Authorization
RBAC
OAuth scopes
Summary
11
API Testing
Contract testing
Performance testing
Acceptance testing
Summary
12
API Quality Assurance
Defining QA
Test planning and execution
Behavioral testing
Regression testing
API monitoring
Summary
Part 4:Releasing an API Product
13
Deploying the API
Continuous integration
API versioning
Incremental API versioning
Semantic API versioning
Calendar-based API versioning
Choosing an API gateway
Summary
14
Observing API Behavior
API usage analytics
Application performance monitoring
User feedback
Aggregating and categorizing feedback
Acting on feedback
Scaling user feedback
Summary
15
Distribution Channels
What is API distribution?
Pricing strategy
API portal
Community
Marketplaces
Documentation
Summary
Part 5:Maintaining an API Product
16
User Support
Helping users get their jobs done
Support channels
Prioritizing bugs and feature requests
Summary
17
API Versioning
Technical requirements
Managing multiple API versions
Breaking changes
Communicating changes
Summary
18
Planning for API Retirement
When should you retire an API?
Communicating API retirement
API product retrospective
Summary
Index
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