Basics of API Design and development

Basics of API Design and development. After the presentation, we developed a python flask-based app that you use to remind yourself anything via an api https://github.com/oquidave/reminderme

David Okwii.
Developer relations,
Africa's Talking.

Transcript

1. API Design & Devp with AT
2. What is an API Similarly, an API lists a bunch of operations that developers can use, along with a description of what they do.
3. How an API works
4. API protocols and Architecture
5. SOAP XML used as data format, - Too verbose on client and server side - Still used by banks and Telcos
6. REST
7. GraphQL
8. HTTP Basics
9. Anatomy of an HTTP Request - The version of the HTTP protocol. - Optional headers that convey additional information for the servers. - Body, for some methods like POST, similar to those in responses, which contain the resource sent.
10. Anatomy of an HTTP Response - HTTP version protocol they follow. - Status code indicating if the request has been successful, or not, and why. - Status message a non-authoritative short description of the status code. - HTTP headers like those for requests. - Optionally a body containing the fetched resource.
11. Representing Data: REST Data formats curl -i -u application_name:application_password --data '{"password": "my_password"}' http://localhost/myapi/1/auth?username=my_usernam e --header 'Content-Type: application/json' --header 'Accept: application/json'
12. API Authentication - There are three common API authentication schemes; - Basic Auth - API keys - OAuth
13. Authentication: Basic Authentication - Basic Auth only requires a username and password. - Passed on via Authorization HTTP header - Server returns http code 401 to let client know authorization failed
14. API Key Authentication - key is usually a long series of letters and numbers that is distinct from the account owner's login password - keys are used simply so the user does not have to give out their password - You can put the key in the Authorization header or add the key onto the URL (http://example.com?api_key=my_se cret_key)
15. Open Authorization (OAuth) - Automates key exchange by providing a standard way for the client to get a key from server through walking user via simple steps. - OAuth 2 involves; - User: Person who wants to connect two websites they use - Client: Website that will be granted access to the user's data - Server: website that has the user's data
16. API design basics - Resources are the nouns of APIs - Key pointers; - Decide what resource(s) need to be available. - Assign URLs to those resources. - Decide what actions the client should be allowed to perform on those resources. - Figure out what pieces of data are required for each action and what format they should be in.
17. Example Rest API actions & url endpoints
18. API Development & testing tools
19. Try out Africa’s Talking APIs
20. Thank You David Okwii, Developer relations, Africa’s talking dokwi@africastalking.com @oquidave on Twitter More cool Resources: • Api security checklist https://github.com/shieldfy/API-Security-Checklist • API best practices: https://www.vinaysahni.com/best-practices-for-a-prag matic-restful-api • Mozilla: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/ Overview • Zapier: https://zapier.com/learn/apis/