API Developer Weekly – June 23, 2016 – Issue #117
A hand-curated weekly newsletter for API developers, published with permission from LaunchAny and CaseySoftware.
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Hot Topics
How To Nail Three Subtle Keys To API Greatness
When you’re an API provider, it’s easy to forget the larger picture in lieu of all of the API details that you need to worry about on a daily basis. But building a great API and engaging the developer community in a relevant way means understanding the context in which it will be used. by Lorinda Brandon [programmableweb.com]
Scaling and securing the Dropbox API
What is Dropbox and what can developers do with your API? Dropbox is all your digital stuff everywhere. Secure backup of your files that you can access on mobile or desktop, anywhere you go. We also give you the ability to share and collaborate on those files with other people. by Gordon Wintrob [medium.com]
Red Hat to Acquire API Management Leader 3scale
Red Hat, Inc. (NYSE: RHT), the world’s leading provider of open source solutions, today announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire 3scale, a leading provider of application programming interface (API) management technology. By adding 3scale to its existing portfolio, including Red Hat JBoss Middleware, Red Hat OpenShift and Red Hat Mobile Application Platform, Red Hat strengthens its enablement of the API economy with simplified cloud integration and microservices-based architectures. [redhat.com]
Twilio prices its IPO at $15 per share, above its previous target
With the pricing, the company expects to raise around $150 million, with an option for another 1.5 million shares to be purchased. It’s also a higher price than the $12-$14 per share price that the company previously targeted. [techcrunch.com]
Twilio: A Retrospective
It’s been over 4 years since I left Twilio but no career experience outside of Runscope has had a bigger impact on me. With the impending Twilio IPO, I’m finding myself especially nostalgic about my time there. I was only there two years, but I learned so much. by John Sheehan [medium.com]
Talking to Uber about the three pillars of its API platform
I spoke with Andrew Noonan, Partner Engineer at Uber. He shared the evolution of the company’s API, from its humble beginnings to a full-featured platform that lets developers build entirely new experiences for Uber riders. We also discussed a systematic approach to building an API platform that incentivizes developers. by Gordon Wintrob [techcrunch.com]
How the Right Technical Writer Can Take API Docs from Good to Great
When RESTful APIs first hit the radar, one of the benefits often cited was that the APIs could be easily understood from the WADL alone. As the API industry evolves , both providers and consumers have started to recognize the need for better, more easily consumed documentation. [programmableweb.com]
The Case for API Management over Web Services
Back in the day Web Services were the de facto standard for accessing “systems of record”. Out of this grew the secured ESB architecture that is synonymous with enterprise architecture. More and more, projects are utilising API Management in those architectures now and pushing on Web Services’ door. [talljhawkins.blogspot.co.uk]
Introducing the Google Sheets API v4: Transferring data from a SQL database to a Sheet
Posted by Wesley Chun (@wescpy), Developer Advocate, Google Apps At Google I/O 2016, we launched a new Google Sheets API-click here to watch the entire announcement. The updated API includes many new features that weren’t available in previous versions, including access to functionality found in the Sheets desktop and mobile user interfaces. [developers.googleblog.com]
Gain control over your JWTs
JWT Inspector is a browser extension that lets you inspect JSON Web Tokens in requests, cookies, and local storage. Also debug any JWT directly from the console or in the built-in UI. [jwtinspector.io]
Go serverless with SwaggerHub and Amazon!
The last few years have brought a gradual shift towards serverless Infrastructure. Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) has changed the landscape bringing low cost, agility, scalability and reliability to the mix. The Amazon API Gateway is one such service which needs no introduction. It is a fully managed platform which allows users to build, deploy and manage APIs at any scale. [swagger.io]
Proposal: Home Documents for HTTP APIs
This document proposes a “home document” format for non-browser HTTP clients. [tools.ietf.org]
Upcoming Web API Events
A list of upcoming Web API Events, maintained by Matthew Reinbold
The Business of APIs
Creating A Brand Guide for Your API
What you let others do with your image is just as important as what you let them do with your API. Hosting a free-to-consume public API is a powerful tool for expanding your functionality and branding into entirely new networks. But many APIs lack comprehensive and digestible guidelines to protect their brand. by Bill Doerrfeld [nordicapis.com]
Internal Hackathons – Jump Start Digital Transformation
Organization culture is often a great barrier to a digital transformation. Getting everyone to think in terms of digital business – rather than business as usual – can be extremely challenging. And, I do mean everyone, from the business to the technical employees. It’s not that people don’t have the potential to change. by Laura Heritage [blog.akana.com]
Kong and Datadog Announce Integration
Mashape is excited to announce our partnership with Datadog. Through an integration with Kong, the most widely used open-source API management platform, Datadog is now available to everyone in our community. Kong features a plugin-oriented architecture which allows you to set up authentication, transformations, security, and manage traffic controls. [blog.mashape.com]
16 ways to build a better dev team
For all the talk of rock-star developers, we all know it takes a strong, coherent team working in concert to get the best work done. So here’s the question: What does it take to establish a great team of developers who create great products and work well across departments? We reached out to tech executives and engineering managers who have done exactly that and asked them to share their hard-earned wisdom of team building. [infoworld.com]
(Un)Related Topics
Most IoT developers aren’t in it for the money
Developers aren’t necessarily like you and me. You may choose to spend your free time making bird houses or watching Friends reruns. Developers, meanwhile, are trying to get Windows 95 to run on an Apple Watch ( and succeeding). This need to tinker is especially pronounced within the IoT developer set. by Matt Asay, Donal Power, David Curry, Ryan Matthew Pierson, Lauren Marinaro, Amanda Razani, Cate Lawrence [readwrite.com]
Democratizing Docker for Enterprise – via @codeship
On the second day of DockerCon in Seattle, Docker CEO Ben Golub announced major improvements to handle enterprise needs with Docker. Golub said that the most security-conscious organizations on the planet are now adopting Docker to address their security concerns and announced partnerships with Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Microsoft Azure, and AWS. by Manuel Weiss [blog.codeship.com]
Breaking Down a Monolithic Software: A Case for Microservices vs. Self-Contained Systems – DZone Integration
Today’s IT publications and discussions are full of such words as digital transformation, bimodal IT, continuous development, and agility. It is hardly debatable that in this light, monolithic architectures and monolithic applications should become a thing of the past sooner or later -preferably, sooner, of course. [dzone.com]
Comparing the speed of VM creation and SSH access of cloud providers
Part 2: Benchmarking the performance of AWS, DigitalOcean, Linode, Vexxhost, Google Cloud, Rackspace, Packet, Cloud A and Microsoft Azure. This blog post provides updated figures for the data published in my article last year (Part 1). For those unfamiliar with the article, the objective of my piece is to measure [blog.cloud66.com]
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