California is a gorgeous state, unfortunately known to the rest of the world for its wildfires, a high cost of living and in some locations, bad traffic. But bad traffic makes for good analogies, especially when it comes to APIs. Both traffic and APIs require a bit of advanced planning, so let\u2019s consider road planning for a moment as a model for API gateways.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When the Spanish founded Los Angeles, they probably weren\u2019t planning for a population of 12 million people geographically locked between an ocean and a desert and mountain range. So, they didn\u2019t plan their streets for the future. Traffic, since the 1800s, has always been an issue. Public transportation hasn\u2019t helped much. Freeways are often more gridlocked than ancillary roads. Growth and use has always eclipsed capacity. I\u2019m sure today\u2019s city planners wish they could start from scratch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With APIs, we have the ability to strategically plan our routes for today and the future \u2014 acting right now to plan the digital roads that will allow for smooth sailing and avoid frequent gridlock. Once we uncover some of the crucial issues that APIs present, we can then assess the thoughtful solutions that are available to us to help us tame the traffic. Our goal is to answer the question,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
APIs began with the concept of simplicity. One road led to one destination. This is why APIs were developed in the first place. We needed one-to-one, easy plug-and-play connections to relieve the stress of coding issues within monolithic systems. APIs answered the question, \u201cWhat if we could reduce the number of points of implementation impact by creating one-off pathways?\u201d APIs allowed for microservices. APIs allowed us to talk to outside entities much more easily. APIs opened new doors of data that were previously difficult to ingest and consume. APIs allowed the digital world to work in real time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The issue is that while APIs have become very commonplace, we are running into the danger of creating too many point-to-point tethered connections, and losing the value that we had found in the original point-to-point idea.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Right now, much API development and administration is still point-to-point between one system and another system, multiplied by many systems and hundreds of APIs. What happens to API development and admin when you\u2019re dealing with hundreds or thousands of separate APIs? This is like paving a separate road for every commuter where the rules for the road are all different and yet they all cross at random locations. A growing population of APIs without an effective way to manage the traffic represents an untenable future. The cloud takes this impossible situation and makes it manageable and less strenuous for everyone involved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The simplest way to understand the value of an API gateway is to understand what could go wrong if APIs aren\u2019t managed properly. Here are just a few issues:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
An API gateway acts as a proxy for each of the APIs that it manages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Let’s assume there are 1000 APIs. Each API is a point-to-point interface. If there is an API between system A and system B, it is a one to one relationship. A gateway is a proxy, exposing the public-facing API endpoints. It then routes the incoming client requests to the relevant services. So, let\u2019s say there is a request coming in from an outside entity which needs to go to two different systems internally. The standard process with no gateway would be that there are two calls made: one from the external system to internal system A and a call from the external system to internal system B. That\u2019s two calls. Multiply those two calls for each required function x 1,000. This is what leads to latency and traffic jams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The API gateway not only routes the incoming client requests to relevant services, but it also aggregates the response data from a variety of different internal APIs and sends back the responses with one request. Less traffic to<\/em> point A. Less return traffic from<\/em> point A.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The API gateway also acts as border security for anything entering the organization. But, like a border security post, monitoring isn\u2019t just about finding insecurity, it is about organizing tasks and proper routing. At the border, there are queues, split apart by various destinations. If you\u2019re traveling to\/from an international airport, you\u2019ve seen how border security works to process people based upon where they are coming from and where they are going. An API gateway efficiently guards the organization\u2019s systems from overuse and abuse by queuing properly. All of the most important performance metrics that would commonly define the success of an API, like requests per minute, latency, errors per minute and API uptime \u2014 are threatened when APIs are distributed and disorganized outside of the gateway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We should mention here that if an organization isn\u2019t seeing clogged traffic just yet, they will. Insurance customers are increasingly choosing \u201cdata-heavy\u201d products and services that will require more API integration and use, as shown in Majesco\u2019s latest Consumer Research<\/a>. APIs aren\u2019t going away and they aren\u2019t becoming fewer in number. Remember the city planners that should have planned ahead. If you are in a position to save your company from future grief by moving APIs to an API Platform in the cloud, now is the time to speak up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a related issue, with distributed APIs and no coordination mechanism, a single outgoing client request can result in multiple round-trip requests. Being able to make a single request to an API gateway, which then routes calls and collates responses is far more efficient. This also dramatically impacts performance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n APIs are game-changers, so there\u2019s no doubt that organizations are finding them useful in every respect. In some innovative organizations, there is a charter that stipulates that they need to utilize APIs as the primary nodes of interaction between various systems, both internally and externally. But if you\u2019re doing that and you aren\u2019t utilizing an API gateway in the cloud, you\u2019re running the risk of having a bunch of interconnected streets and avenues with no sense of logic or a set of rules constructed between them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Without an API Platform-based approach, you run the risk of a network ofconnectivity where the systems and functions are too complex to understand the impact of changes. When you end up having to either upgrade a particular API or troubleshoot it, it becomes an exercise in network engineering. Imagine being an electrical engineer, sorting through a host of painted wires that are mixed up with no schematic, and you have to literally take out each wire by itself. Simple APIs lose their simplicity as they multiply with no documentation or governance. As the network slows, the errors will grow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The API Platform-based approach brings order to the chaos. Traffic management is far easier because the system knows and understands the APIs and their relationships to one another. And, it\u2019s smart enough to be able to share its knowledge with us, which is something we\u2019ll discuss in a few weeks when we talk about an API gateway and its ability to automatically document the details of each API.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If we step back and look at the Pre-cloud-driven services world, to implement an effective API gateway would entail a huge amount of rearchitecting, reworking of existing APIs, and then making sure that all of the connections, programming and system protocols are aligned. There are organizations that do this, but the cloud has given us a much more logical option. <\/p>\n\n\n\n What we have today is not necessarily \u201cdrag and drop\u201d programming, but it’s closer to drag and drop than to reprogramming. Cloud-based solution providers like Microsoft Azure have made the process workable and efficient. Everything that an organization would have needed to invent on their own in-house, is provided as a standard part of the process. Cloud technology choices are so much simpler because of their ease of use, their pre-built functions and their simple configurability. And, of course, cloud gives us the speed that we and our customers crave in our transactions and communication. There is simply no comparison when working with APIs in-house. Those who do still find themselves turning to hybrid solutions or mirroring data on the cloud to stay secure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n Of course, one of the biggest hurdles to migrating your APIs to a cloud-based solution is just the decision to do it. The actual migration itself is fairly simple. The API migration playbooks already exist. They are precise, \u201chands on\u201d directions for making the switch. It\u2019s not neuroscience. The ease of migration is actually one of the greatest motivators to do it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cloud providers make it possible to envelop an existing API architecture and a library of existing APIs with cloud-enabled orchestration. They have a toolkit that provides you with everything you need for API discoverability, plus a documentation library, with a system-generated capability of defining new APIs so that you don’t have to unlearn and relearn how to define and document your APIs. The process is thoughtful and smart.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Things like security and load balancing are all predefined in these platforms. You simply have to customize the API gateway to your organization’s needs. It\u2019s like selecting a new Tesla. You can\u2019t change the primary functions of the car, but you can add the various options that fit your taste. This is what a cloud-based solution does for insurers for organizations that already have APIs. It not only delivers the cloud, but it easily guides IT teams through the process. We\u2019ll discuss this more when we talk about developer and user roles in upcoming weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In our next cloud blog, we\u2019ll discuss documentation, administration and governance in the new API Platform environment. (Spoiler alert: It\u2019s much simpler, highly automated and built for security and consistency.) If you\u2019re interested in learning more about API use and in API gateways in the cloud, find out more about Majesco CloudInsurer\u00ae solutions<\/a>, built for today\u2019s digital customers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" California is a gorgeous state, unfortunately known to the rest of the world for its wildfires, a high cost of living and in some locations, bad traffic. But bad traffic makes for good analogies, especially when it comes to APIs. Both traffic and APIs require a bit of advanced planning, so let\u2019s consider road planning…<\/p>\nAPI gateways avoid \u201cchatty\u201d outgoing client requests<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
API performance isn\u2019t just about traffic flow, it\u2019s about reducing API traffic \u201caccidents.\u201d<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
API gateways are cloud-based because that\u2019s where they are effective<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
The \u201churdle\u201d of API migration<\/h2>\n\n\n\n