Application Programming Interface (API) Design discusses best practises for creating libraries intended for general purpose or public use.
59
votes
3answers
10k views
What is an Anti-Corruption layer, and how is it used?
I'm trying to figure out what the Anti-Corruption layer really means. I know that it's a way to transition/work around legacy code or bad APIs. What I don't understand is how it works and what makes ...
41
votes
6answers
4k views
How necessary is it to follow defensive programming practices for code that will never be made publicly available?
I'm writing a Java implementation of a card game, so I created a special type of Collection I'm calling a Zone. All modification methods of Java's Collection are unsupported, but there's a method in ...
19
votes
8answers
1k views
“Public APIs are forever: Only one chance to get it right”?
In an OS book I just read that, "Public APIs are forever: Only one chance to get it right". Is it true? Is it applicable only in APIs of Operating Systems or other APIs too? For example, will this be ...
13
votes
3answers
7k views
Is there a list of common usernames to reserve in a new system?
I need to reserve usernames in my new website.
These generally fall into three categories
1) usernames no-one should have (eg: admin, user, service, help, root, etc)
2) names of super famous people ...
7
votes
1answer
4k views
When to use nested resources in a RESTful API
I have two resources: users and links.
Users can have several links associated with them. I have designed my RESTful API so that you can reach the links associated with a user at the following URI:
...
6
votes
2answers
737 views
Is a data service API a good idea?
We currently have a monolithic Rails application that is really three separate applications that make use of the same data. In trying to figure out how to properly compartmentalize and break the ...
1
vote
2answers
237 views
In my permissions API, how do I handle objects that don't exist?
Elgg is designing a permissions API loosely around the Activity Streams model. The user API could look (roughly) like:
function elgg_can($capability, $subject = null, $object = null, $target = null) ...
3
votes
3answers
434 views
API method placement guidelines?
Are there any guidelines for placing methods in API when the placement isn't obvious?
Example: I have classes A and B and a method X. The work being carried out can be phrased in two ways:
A does X ...
1
vote
2answers
185 views
Should I use HTTP search
I am working on a web api and I am curios about the HTTP SEARCH verb and how you should use it.
My first approach was, well you could use it surely for a search. But asp.net WebApi doesn't support ...
0
votes
1answer
34 views
How to API design architecture for long delay process
Im trying to start an API design using Django Rest Framework, and the problem Im trying to solve is the following:
Request endpoint is like this:
POST
http://server:8080/api/v1/device
attribute: ...
