APIs.JSON - technology for building the Web of APIs. Talk from the APIStrat unconference at Gluecon. 19th May 2015

1. APIs.JSON
Bootstrapping The Web of
APIs
Steven Willmott
3scale Inc
@3scale - http://www.3scale.net
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/us/

2. On Demand API Infrastructure:
http://3scale.net
http://www.apitools.net/ @3scale
me: @njyx on twitter
600 Customers
Billions API Calls / Month

3. APIs.JSON
• Collaborative effort between (initially):
• Now has plenty of other contributors (see the
site: http://www.apisjson.org and mailing list:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/apisjson
).

4. To the content…

5. The Internet / Web are and were
made of “very little”
• TCP/IP
• BGP
• HTTP
• HTML
• DNS
• Directories
• Search
• Certificates
• …

6. “Shared Standards &
Bootstrapping”
The History of the Web is:

7. What About The Web of APIs?
So:
Definition: Global, discoverable, reusable
network of API Services accessible via the public
Internet

8. (We might Stop and Ask)
• What about private networks?
• Is the Web of APIs not the Web itself?
• Do the APIs have to be “open”?
• …

9. Today we have…
• Existing Web stack
• Wide range of protocols
• Description formats like Swagger,
Blueprint, RAML, WADL, WSDL
• But we lack:
The Ability to Bootstrap

10. The Web Relied On
• Directories
• MetaData
• Links
• Search
• Filtering
• Derived Authority
Need the same
for APIs

11. APIs.JSON
How are APIs Changing Application
Development?

12. Idea:
APIs.JSON: Metadata format for API
Description and Definition

13. Single Location so it can be found
Pointers to other descriptions an location
Layers on top of DNS
Format is not that important
Consensus / Adoption / Tools are
Benefits Multiply at Scale

14. You can use it to…
• Flag where your APIs are
• Link to definitions
• Configure those APIs and related services
• Track and Signal Change
• …

15. http://www.apisjson.org
http://www.apis.io
• 900+ APIs listed on APIs.IO
• Search Engine is open source (at least one fork)
• Others are building their own
• Open forum for discussion

16. Governance
• APIS.json has grown & people are investing
real energy
• Time to “grow up” a little
• Objectives:
– Keep moving fast
– Make sure voices are heard
– Involve those who are most invested
– Baby steps

17. Proposal
• Lightweight group
– Github repo for the specification
– Anyone can issue a pull request
– Everything creative commons and open source
– Regular major version
– Steering team to manage major version releases
– Individuals not companies
• Discussion:
– No IP laden submissions
– Civil conversation
– Driven by working implementation

18. Short term
• Short term:
– Add people to the steering group
– Encourage feedback
• Mid term:
– Community decisions on steering group
• Long term:
– If it takes off and generates value …
– Into a formal body?

19. Take Away’s
1
2
The Web of APIs is the Future of the
Web
But we need to bootstrap it…
=>
Automated Descriptions and
Metadata are critical to that
endeavor

20. Keep Building!
steve@3scale.net
@njyx, @3scale
We make awesome API management tools:
http://www.3scale.net/