Instructor: Okay, so now we understand
why do we need API,
but why do we need a well-designed API?
What is the point of having a best practices for API
and having a complete course
about how to design a really, really good API?
Well, the reason is quite simple.
You always need to remember that the developers
who are using your API are actually customers.
Whether they actually pay for the API
or they just use it freely,
they are still customers.
And as customers, they do have alternatives.
You are probably not the only one
to offer these kinds of data and services from your API
and you probably have some kind of competition.
In order to win the competition
and win the hearts of the developers and clients,
your API should be easy to use and consistent
because if the developers will have hard time
understanding what exactly is going on in the API
and how to use it and why for specific services
the API looks like this
and for other services the API looks like that,
then they will simply won't use it
and they will go to the competition
and you don't want that to happen.
In addition, satisfied customers equal less support call.
You don't want to spend all your time and money
on support centers answering questions from angry developers
who simply don't understand what is going on
and why simple things suddenly stopped working.
So, in order to get satisfied customers
and a lot of customers
and to win the hearts and money
of the developers and customers,
you must have a well-designed and easy-to-use API.