Net API Notes for 2022/02/03 - Issue 188
Happy February!
Despite the temperatures remaining frigid in the north country, I'm past my post-holiday malaise, have an array of existing news in the hopper, and am looking excitedly toward the future!
Meanwhile, several great API pieces got lodged in my browser tab. Let's get to the notes!
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NOTES
WHAT IF YOUR API PROGRAM HAD A DO-OVER?
STRAT / DESIGN / DOC / DEV & TEST / DEPLOY / SECURITY / MONITOR / DISCOVERY
Janet Wagner, writing on the Stoplight blog, posed an interesting question: "What If Your API Program Had a Fresh Start?. API notables Lorinda Brandon, Jason Harmon, James Higginbotham, Sophie Rutard, and Erik Wilde answered that question.
A common theme among all the answers was increased communication, whether that was between tech and business, builders and stakeholders, or executive leaders and those in the trenches. For example, Sophie Rutard said she would:
"Invest significantly more in communications — communications to internal key stakeholders (CIO, Market Mgmt, Sales) regarding the business value and operational imperatives (API governance, design, etc.) to the program’s success."
The purpose of all this additional communication is to win over key stakeholders "earlier in the process".
For more on that and several other recommendations, give the article a look.
UK GOVERNMENT DEFINING AN API STRATEGY
STRAT / DESIGN / DOC / DEV & TEST / DEPLOY / SECURITY / MONITOR / DISCOVERY
I continue to be impressed with the degree of "official" API guidance coming from the UK government. The latest, published at the last possible moment of 2021, was their recommendations on defining an API Management strategy.
That article, along with the rest of the site, is a treasure trove of insightful API advice. Unfortunately, I didn't see individual contributor names on the site otherwise, I'd be more specific in my praise. If you know what individuals or teams were involved with this resource, let me know.
WHAT WE CAN LEARN FROM THE MIDI STANDARD
STRAT / DESIGN / DOC / DEV & TEST / DEPLOY / SECURITY / MONITOR / DISCOVERY
MIDI is a musical instrument communication standard that has been around since the early 80s. Before MIDI, musical devices (mostly synthesizers) depended on analog control voltages. The problem with this approach is that one cable could only do one thing! With MIDI, you could send note information with gate, velocity, aftertouch, modulation, control, and clock over each of 16 channels.
Despite its age, it remains as relevant today as it was when first introduced in 1983. In his piece, "Learning from MIDI", Simon St. Laurent hypothesized reasons why this is the case, along with lessons that can be applied in our API standard making.
Among MIDI's many "bugs" (or features):
- It's extremely serial, which makes sense given the linear flow of how we perceive music - imagine if the song's chorus arrived for playback before the introduction! But as MIDI gets ported to distributed environments like the web, playback suffers without significant workarounds.
- Messages fire off without acknowledgment by other parties; there's no capacity for retries or back-off if the receiver is down. Further, something like a computer UI can't "request" the current knob or button state of a device on startup; it can only update the visual representation with whatever data is sent during a performance.
- Many standard, yet rarely used, messages get repurposed by various manufacturers. While messy, it has given ongoing life as vendors add additional capabilities that wouldn't otherwise be able to co-exist with original intent.
This piece resonated with me. I have a long history of digital music production (some good, mostly bad). My senior computer engineering project was also a dedicated hardware device for 'looping' MIDI phrases across devices. Even at that point in my career, I remember thinking how "imprecise" working with things on the bit level was.
Since then, I've come to appreciate "just enough" standards; HTML (not XHTML) fits the bill here. Markdown, warts and all, is another one of these. The "fuzziness" at the edges draws ire from people expecting the precision of a mathematical equation. What makes them persist, however, is an imperfection approximating people.
MILESTONES
- The EU has approved Facebook's purchase of Kustomer, a CRM maker. The approval is contingent on a guarantee of "non-discriminatory access without charge to public APIs".
- OpenSea's API went down, causing several services, including the popular crypto wallet MetaMask, to have trouble displaying NFTs. This is a different issue than the hacker who abused the OpenSea API to buy NFTs at older (and cheaper) prices.
- Tesla was hacked via API keys obtained from an insecure application.
- Pinwheel raised $50M Series B for its income verification APIs
- API rating service APIMetrics is acquiring APIScience
- The API Handyman, Arnaud Lauret, has joined Postman.
- Alan Glickenhouse, who some might know from his work on digital transformation and API evangelism, retired from IBM after 40 years. Wunderbar!
WRAPPING UP
What goes into a successful API review? Why does it matter? Late last month, I tackled these questions (and more) in '5 Tips for a Game-Changing API Design Review'. I was pleased with how this one turned out.
But I'm not done yet! Ever wonder who works with APIs? I've got an article up about that, too. The answer, and the potential ramifications, may surprise you.
Want even more API info? NetAPI.events is a collection of upcoming events, presentations, and conferences - including all eleven APIDays 2022 events. I also listed the QCon in-person and online conferences, as well. Check them out!
Finally, thank you to the Patrons. Your steadfast support helps mine the memes and mince the words when things get tough.
Till next time,
Matthew @libel_vox and matthewreinbold.com