Evolvable API Clients: How to move fast and _not_ break things - Defrag 2015

Any client that consumes APIs today has to hard-code back-end logic at deploy time. This means that any change that happens in the API it consumes will break the client, necessitating an update.

Imagine a client that can enter an API without knowing about implementation details, but instead just understanding the semantics of the API. We can get the implementation details of the API at run-time to allow us to change them at any point. This gives us the ability to control features of the API without breaking our clients.

It means that in the future you don’t have to redeploy your client to make changes to the implementation, and you don’t have to leave your existing users in a broken state with a dated version of your application.

Transcript

1. Emmanuel Paraskakis @manp How to move fast… …and _not_ break things!
2. Apiary.io
3. Collaborate on API Design 196,756 APIs 2.1M+ API Consumers 148,452 API Designers
4. Design-first
5. Good API Design
7. v2.0
8. Redeploy All The Things!
9. Evolve 
 All The Things!
10. 1. Semantics, not Implementation Details
11. 1. Semantics, not Implementation Details
12. 1. Semantics, not Implementation Details
13. 2. Evolving Business Rules
14. 2. Evolving Business Rules
15. 2. Evolving Business Rules
16. 3. Let HATEOS drive your UI
17. 3. Let HATEOS drive your UI
18. 3. Let HATEOS drive your UI
20. • Defer Architectural Decisions • Improvise, Adapt, Overcome • Ever Higher Abstractions • Embrace Change • Decouple Evolvable Clients
21. _links https://github.com/the-hypermedia-project/Hyperdrive https://github.com/kylef/Starship https://github.com/the-hypermedia-project/ representor-swift https://github.com/apiaryio/polls-app http://smizell.com/weblog/2014/solving-fizzbuzz- with-hypermedia