APIs
How software talks to software — and why every product you design is really a bundle of APIs.
Hour 1 — The contract
- What an API is: a menu of things you can ask another program to do
- REST in plain language: URLs as nouns, methods as verbs (GET, POST)
- GraphQL in one idea: ask for exactly what you need
- API keys, rate limits, and why "free" APIs aren't
- Reading API documentation as a designer — enough to know what's possible
- The weather API walkthrough: request in, JSON out, pixels rendered
Hour 2 — Studio
- Exercise: Exercise - API MashupExercise - API Mashup
Build a page powered by someone else's data
Use a public API to make a small, well-designed page that displays live data — and understand the request/response loop underneath it.
Ideas
Weathe... — use AI to build a small page powered by a public API (weather, movies, maps, transit) - JSON literacy: reading the response with your own eyes
Homework
- Write a one-paragraph explanation of how an API works, as if to a client. (This is the official "API Concept Explanation" assignment.)