What an API is?
First thing first, an API stands for Application Programming Interface. It’s just the way software talks to each other. It’s basically a software intermediary between two different applications.
APIs are all around us, it’s integrated to almost all the modern applications now. Be it a chatting app, weather checking app, food order, online shopping, cab order etc.
For software developers API is the most crucial to create any application. Every application has it’s core purpose, to fulfil that an app might need to get various other services like maps for a cab aggregator service. So, that’s where APIs comes to the rescue.
A better understanding of APIs
Communication is very important for any living thing and now for apps too just to make the interaction easier between living things. Why? Because communication creates connectivity and connectivity creates magical services or products.
All applications need to gather various data from various other servers and applications just to give us the end result. And APIs make that possible.
For e.g. If we book an uber, the front-end of the application will give us all the information like nearby available cabs, fare etc. But when we book it, it shows us map then that which is being shown or interacting with us is an API. That map application and uber application are talking to each other to give us the end result which is availability, ETA after booking, distance between us and driver.
Same with food ordering apps, ofc if there is no map to show how far our delivery boy is and what’s the ETA some of us might go crazy and even break things in our room because it’s food, long wait can’t be tolerated. That’s again an API.
One more example is suppose if we want to book a flight we might directly book it from the airlines website like Vistara or in that case there won’t be so much API interaction, it’s just Vistaras own server. But if we book it from a travel aggregator website like makemytrip then it has to fetch al the information from various airlines database. So, every airlines application has their API which allows other to get data and use it according to their policies.
Modern APIs
APIs have become so valuable that they are now the major source revenue for so many SAAS companies. Major companies like Google, eBay, Salesforce.com, Amazon, and Expedia are just a few of the companies that make money from their APIs.
Earlier APIs used to be described as an general connectivity interface to an application. However, Modern API has some more valuable and useful characteristics like :
Modern APIs adhere to standards (typically HTTP and REST), that are developer-friendly, easily accessible and understood broadly.
They are more like products than code. They are designed for consumption for specific audiences (e.g., mobile developers), they are documented, and they are versioned in a way that users can have certain expectations of its maintenance and lifecycle.
Because they are much more standardized, they have a much stronger discipline for security and governance, as well as monitored and managed for performance and scale.
Types of API
Internal APIs are only for use within the organisation. No outside access. It’s usually for high level confidentiality or proprietary informations.
Partner APIs are for only few selected, segmented partner to use.
Public APIs are basically for everyone, anyone can use it according to the policies.
Conclusion
APIs has been the most amazing development in software industry to achieve the end result. It’s not sensible for food ordering app to work on Maps and stuff, they should be able to use service from some service providers and yes APIs made that possible. It not only makes the overall system efficient but more profitable and scalable too just because you can focus on your core areas or niche instead of creating everything from scratch.