Most organizations with a web presence build and operate APIsâ??the doorway for customers to interact with the companyâ??s services. Designing, building, and managing these critical programs affect everyone in the organization, from engineers and product owners to C-suite executives. But the real challenge for developers and solution architects is creating an API platform from the ground up. With this practical book, youâ??ll learn strategies for building and testing REST APIs that use API gateways to combine offerings at the microservice level. Authors James Gough, Daniel Bryant, and Matthew Auburn demonstrate how simple additions to this infrastructure can help engineers and organizations migrate to the cloudâ?? and open the opportunity to connect internal services using technologies like a service mesh.
Learn API fundamentals and architectural patterns for building an API platform Explore evolving trends such as asynchronous and streaming APIs Help drive your API program by performing an informed architectural role Build and configure key components of an API platform Deploy gateways and service meshes based on case studies Understand core security and vulnerabilities in API architecture Secure data and services using OAuth 2.0, TLS, and web application firewalls
Provides an overview of the core concepts but does not go very deep. Thankfully where depth is lacking, there are plenty of pointers to other resources. The worked example becomes tiresome and is repeated in review for much of the final chapter. No real coverage of green field API development focusing more on rearchitecting. The security chapter was repetitive with the expounding of the STRIDE acronym immediately followed by a restatement and application to the worked example. Good for beginners in the field, those experienced will benefit more from reading Principles of Web API Design: Delivering Value with APIs and Microservices (Addison-Wesley Signature Series.
Although this book is supposedly about "API" and "Architecture," it does not focus on any topics. It describes in little detail some concepts related to APIs, even with some examples that resemble real-life situations, but leaves further research to the reader. There's no depth similar to Software Architecture: The Hard Parts or other books where you could understand how one would address various scenarios, which are pretty complex. All laid out in Mastering API Architecture can be found on the internet in 5 minutes. So it's a good starter book, but no more than that.
It's good to read and refresh the rules of building modern APIs. I truly appreciate the list of the tools and webpages listed by the authors, that allow to stay on the technology edge and be familiar with upcoming changes
I would have benefitted from a glossary. Maybe I’m the wrong target audience but I found the book to be less informative than I would have liked. I want to better understand what our devs are talking about at work and I don’t think I’ve come out ahead. The case study scenario was uninspiring.
There are good chapters -about API gateway, Service mesh with a lot of interesting considerations from history to current patterns. But a lot of chapters are barely related to API, e.g., the one about testing, talking about test pyramid, etc.