Key Questions to Ask When Managing an API

by Spencer Nguyen • August 16, 2021

You need data for every facet of your business. It's a powerful tool. Business and IT leaders need efficient ways to collect, store, and integrate that data in order to gain the valuable insights that drive business success. API-Led data integration is the way forward. But businesses are increasingly looking for low code solutions to help manage APIs for a streamlined process. In this post, we're going to talk about the key questions that you need to address when you're managing an API. What does your team need to know going in? And what will become important moving forward?

The Benefits to API-Led Data Integration

API-led data integration offers an excellent advantage because you can control the integration of data between various platforms. This is especially advantageous as many businesses move to cloud computing.

An API-led approach gives you the flexibility necessary to access your data from disparate databases and platforms. It offers a simplified approach so that your company can access separate sets of data to use in combination for true insights. With this in mind, you can customize your approach to integration. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel. You can launch a workable, customized, and efficient API in a matter of minutes. This gives you a more efficient way to maintain your data. APIs can be changed and tested with minimal if any downtime.

API-Led Data Integration Ease of Use

One of the first questions your team needs to address is the ease of use in managing your API. Can you manage your APIs in a single, central location? Is the application secure and do I have complete governance? What is the methodology used when working with the API? Does your team have to use different systems and are there multiple login points?

The point of working with API-led data integration is to make your use of data easier. That's always the goal. And for many companies, coding and development is the biggest beast. We talked about the problems in handwriting the code for your database APIs. It's expensive. It's a lengthy process and there is a lot of effort to guarantee quality. Choosing a no-code platform like DreamFactory takes the hassle out of API development and allows you to focus on how to best manage the API in integrating your businesses systems and applications.

Provisioning New Policies for Your API

You need to know how detailed and time-consuming it will be to provision new policies for an individual API and whether you can accomplish this for all of your APIs at once. With DreamFactory, the process is simplified. You can work with the same databases or completely separate databases, This means that you can work effectively and quickly to provision your API (or multiple APIs). This can be a low or no-code solution so your team can easily launch and scale.

Monitoring Your API

Monitoring your API is an integral part of the process. While creating your API from scratch can be exceptionally time-consuming and fraught with problems in quality and consistency, the actual truth of how well your API functions is in day-to-day use.

DreamFactory offers an ELK stack. This gives you logging and reporting on your API traffic that allows you to monitor your performance in real-time - a crucial component in managing and API. There are flexible reporting options so that you can customize your configuration dashboard for your team's ideal use.

Before you launch, you need to have an accurate assessment of how you'll monitor the API across your organization. Can you see the API usage easily? Do you have accurate reporting options for usage? Before you begin, you need to understand the goals for the solution so that you can effectively create benchmarks.

What About Downtime?

Things change. In technology, that's a vast understatement. Your API needs to be flexible and scalable. This means that you need to be able to pivot and alter policies after the API is launched. What will this mean for you and your organization? Will it lead to downtime? Make sure when you're researching API solutions, there are verifiable reasons to trust your business continuity to your provider.

Look to DreamFactory for Your API Management

Managing an API can be difficult, particularly when you do not have experience in coding and software development. Are you looking for solutions that are low and no code to help you manage your APIs? DreamFactory is an API generation platform that's perfectly suited to help your business launch APIs that secure your data and help you use it to develop insights to propel your business growth. DreamFactory provides a comprehensive API management solution that generates, secures, documents and deploys all of your APIs in a single consolidated platform.

We can help you build your API in minutes. Sign up for a 14-day free trial and get started with your APIs today. Custom-made for your best use.