What are we defining as an API?

[Martin Pilkington]

I think it would be important to define what APIs we are looking at targeting, as there are various different types. Some are simply to allow integration between applications, whereas some are entire platforms. You have APIs like Facebook, Twitter, PayPal etc which are integration APIs, but then ones like Rails, Django, .Net and Cocoa which are platform APIs. Should these be treated separately and if so, how and why?

There is a major distinction between the two on one key item: versioning. An integration API is often harder to version and change, whereas a platform API can provide a clean break, especially during backwards incompatible changes. You can choose whether to use Rails 2.x or Rails 3.0 for example, but there isn't much choice in something like the Twitter API.

Thanks

Martin

[Stuart Herbert]

I think Aral setup the group to deal with what you're calling integration APIs; APIs provided to third-party developers by SaaS vendors.

Best regards,

Stu

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Stuart Herbert

e: stu...@stuartherbert.com
t: +44 7966 284577
w: http://www.stuartherbert.com/
b: http://blog.stuartherbert.com/

[Ross Ritchey]

I think we need to have different types of ratings depending on the
type of API.

So - an Integration API score for things like Facebook, Twitter,
PayPal, etc
and a Platform API score for bigger things like Rails.

[Fending]

I'm in agreement with Stu on this one, unless the anecdotes (see that
thread - good call @aral) prove otherwise. We should probably stick to
engineering what we need to around actual experiences where possible,
though there may be some (but how much, really?) value in that extra
effort.

[Aral Balkan]

What Stu said :)

Aral