InterLab 2013: Opening up your data with web service APIs (and how to make this easier)

The labs have a lot of great data that we often need to share. There’s also a push from the White House to make data more open and machine readable within the government. Web service APIs can be an excellent way to easily share your data both externally and internally. However, if you’re building APIs, there are things to think through like API keys, access control, analytics, rate limiting, documentation, and more. But these are the boring parts of releasing and managing your APIs, so join us to find out how you can quickly leverage existing resources to minimize the amount of time you have to spend thinking about such things. This lets you can focus on the fun parts of actually sharing your data and seeing the benefits.

So come hear about the basics of APIs, how they can benefit your team, and real-world success stories from NREL. Also hear about how we’ve teamed up with data.gov to launch api.data.gov, a free service aimed at helping federal agencies publish and manage their APIs in an easy way. Finally, learn about how all this relates to the Digital Government Strategy and the Open Data Policy, and how you can leverage these resources to more efficiently release APIs, fulfilling these policy requirements, but, more importantly, making your users happy.

Transcript

1. Photo by LEOL30! http://flickr.com/photos/lwr/2049140305!
2. Photo by Richard North! http://flickr.com/photos/richardnorth/7804900260!
3. Photo by Bart! http://flickr.com/photos/cayusa/549883494!
4. Photo by Jonathan W! http://flickr.com/photos/s3a/4816964540!
5. APIs / Web Services! Interlab 2013! Nick Muerdter! 08/07/2013!
6. What Are APIs?
 Web Services?!
7. Machine-Readable Data
 
 For Other Programmers!
9. Why?
 How?!
10. Contrived Example!!
11. Meet
 Joe Schmoe…
 
 He wants to build an app! Photo by Christian Montone! http://flickr.com/photos/christianmontone/4520976000!
12. Average prices for alternative fuel
 
 Best app ever!!
13. Where’s the data?!
18. What about a
 web service?!
19. What about a
 web service?!
20. Let’s Build It! Photo from The Library of Congress! http://flickr.com/photos/library_of_congress/2179060449!
21. Step #1
 Import data into database!
22. Step #2
 Implement web service!
23. require "sinatra"! require "multi_json"! require "sinatra/json"! require "sequel"! ! DB = Sequel.sqlite("fuel_prices.db")! ! get "/fuel-prices.json" do! records = DB.fetch("SELECT *! FROM fuel_prices ORDER BY date DESC")! ! return json(records.to_a)! end  
25. Step #3
 Let’s make it do a little more…!
26. get "/fuel-prices/latest.json" do! latest_date = DB.fetch("SELECT MAX(date) AS max_date! FROM fuel_prices").get(:max_date)! ! records = DB.fetch("SELECT *! FROM fuel_prices! WHERE date = ? ORDER BY date DESC", latest_date)! ! return json(records.to_a)! end! ! get "/fuel-prices/fuels/:fuel.json" do! records = DB.fetch("SELECT *! FROM fuel_prices! WHERE fuel = ? ORDER BY date DESC", params[:fuel])! ! return json(records.to_a)! end  
28. Joe Schmoe’s excited!! Photo by Christian Montone! http://flickr.com/photos/christianmontone/4520976000!
29. I should be excited too!!
30. If policy is more
 your thing…!
31. 2012
 Digital Government Strategy!
32. API Bonanza!! “Make Open Data, Content, and Web APIs the New Default”! ! “Make Existing High-Value Data and Content Available through Web APIs”!
34. 2013
 Open Data Policy!
35. So…
 In the real world?!
36. Photo by quinn.anya! http://flickr.com/photos/quinnanya/5330238309!
37. Photo by OregonDOT! http://www.flickr.com/photos/oregondot/6474147839!
38. Since October 2011…
 
 ~ 3 million external API hits
 ~ 70 million internal API hits!
39. API Management! Dealing with the high-level aspects of releasing your APIs!
40. •  Documentation! •  API keys! •  Access control! •  Analytics! •  Rate limiting! •  etc.!
41. What does this look like in government?!
42. Photo by alandberning! http://www.flickr.com/photos/14617207@N00/4872111479!
43. Deployment Transportation services Analysis Solar services Commercial Buildings Buildings services … … … …
45. Users Don’t Care! Photo from National Media Museum! http://www.flickr.com/photos/nationalmediamuseum/3589381656!
46. Photo by mike! http://www.flickr.com/photos/mlcastle/3151469713!
47. A Platform! Photo by Musée McCord Museum! http://www.flickr.com/photos/museemccordmuseum/5348751435!
48. Photo by Peter Roome! http://www.flickr.com/photos/roome/515419918! API! Umbrella!
49. developer.nrel.gov!
50. DATA.GOV
51. api.data.gov!
52. Shared API management service for federal agencies!
53. API keys!
54. Documentation!
55. Rate Limits!
56. Analytics!
65. nick.muerdter@nrel.gov! @nickblah! developer.nrel.gov! github.com/WhiteHouse/api-standards! github.com/NREL/api-umbrella! howto.gov/mobile/apis-in-government! api.data.gov!