(3) @dret on Twitter/GitHub

(4) Microservice Architecture (2016)

• Microservice Architecture: Aligning Principles, Practices, and Culture [https://www.apiacademy.co/resources/books/microservice-architecture-aligning-principles-practices-culture]
  • O'Reilly book page [http://shop.oreilly.com/product/0636920050308.do]
  • Amazon book page [https://www.amazon.com/Microservice-Architecture-Aligning-Principles-Practices/dp/1491956259]
• Authored by API Academy [http://www.apiacademy.co/] members Irakli Nadareishvili, Ronnie Mitra, Matt McLarty, and Mike Amundsen

(5) Continuous API Management (2018)

• Continuous API Management: Making the Right Decisions in an Evolving Landscape [https://www.apiacademy.co/resources/books/continuous-api-management]
  • O'Reilly book page [http://shop.oreilly.com/product/0636920201755.do]
  • Amazon book page [https://www.amazon.com/Continuous-Api-Management-Decisions-Landscape/dp/1492043559]
• Authored by API Academy [http://www.apiacademy.co/] members Mehdi Medjaoui, Erik Wilde, Ronnie Mitra, and Mike Amundsen

(6) About Me

• Ph.D. in Communications Systems [http://dret.net/netdret/publications#wil97b] from ETH Zürich [http://www.ethz.ch/]
• Working on Web Architecture after writing the first Web Technology book [http://dret.net/netdret/publications#wil98]
• UC Berkeley (2006-2011), working on Service Models for Open Government [http://dret.net/netdret/publications#wil09g]
• EMC (2011-2014), working on transforming software products into service platforms
• Siemens (2014-2015), working on using IoT to build WoT (APIs for Things)
• Part of CA [http://www.ca.com/]'s API Academy [http://www.apiacademy.co/] 2016-2019 focusing on API Design and Management
• Joined Good API [https://www.goodapi.co/] in 2019 focusing on API Strategy and Guidance for Digital Transformation
• Active in the usual places such as Twitter [http://twitter.com/dret], GitHub [http://github.com/dret], and LinkedIn [http://www.linkedin.com/in/netdret]

(7) Good API [http://www.goodapi.co/]

• International team based in Prague and Zurich
  • Adam Kliment: @ntmlk [http://twitter.com/ntmlk]
  • Zdenek Z Nemec: @zdne [http://twitter.com/zdne]
  • Erik Wilde: @dret [http://twitter.com/dret]
• Working on Digital Transformation and API Strategy and Programs
  • Planning and coaching digital transformation initiatives
  • Formulating API strategies for building a solid foundation
  • Executing API programs to turn API strategies into API landscapes

(9) Digital Transformation Vision

Our Digital Transformation Initiative puts a focus on innovation by allowing us to more quickly develop and execute on new ideas. Innovation is the driving force that allows us to improve engagement with existing customers, and to explore new markets.

The Digital Transformation Initiative will turn us into the industry leader by allowing us to interact with our customers more easily and more frequently. By increasing the number of customer touchpoints and using the resulting feedback to quickly and relentlessly adapt and improve our offerings, we will turn into the market leader within the next three years.

(10) The Execution Gap

(11) Jeff Bezos' Services Rant: The Rules [https://gist.github.com/chitchcock/1281611]

• Famous small set of SOA design rules
  • Teams must expose functionality through services
  • Communication happens only through service interfaces
  • There are no hard guidelines for service design
  • Internal/external service is a matter of policy, not one of design
• Going against the let's pick an implementation platform spirit of old-school SOA
  • Decoupling implementations at design-time and at runtime

(12) Jeff Bezos' Services Rant: The Consequences [https://plus.google.com/+RipRowan/posts/eVeouesvaVX]

• With more freedom comes more responsibility
  • Monitoring and metrics are necessary for finding root causes
  • All APIs must be hardened against DoS attacks
  • Automated QA is necessary to really understand service health
  • Services must be documented and registered so that they can be discovered
  • Debugging becomes harder because of service dependencies
• Sophisticated tooling required to manage the new SOA landscape
• Much easier in today's technology landscape than 15 years ago

(13) Two Digital Transformation Fallacies

• Setting a vision is enough to make it happen
  • Digital transformation is a deep process touching everything in the organization
  • Defining and executing business, organizational, and technical strategies is essential
• Restructuring IT will cause digital transformation to bubble up
  • The business and organizational pillars are essential to success
  • IT has to align with the digital transformation strategy and program

(14) Services and APIs and UIs

• Services are the concepts that provide business value
  • Decomposing organizations in composable services makes management easier
• APIs are the technical representation of services
  • Application Programming Interface (API) as a programmable service representation
• UIs are the human-oriented representation of APIs
  • User Interface (UI) for allowing human users access to a service through an API

(15) The Wonders of APIs

(16) Digital Transformation Status

(18) Example Scenario: Shipping

• User journeys identify valuable ways of interacting with a service

(19) Level 1: Digitization

• Digitization: Use digital technologies for implementing capabilities

(20) Level 2: Digitalization

• Digitalization: Build digital value chains from digital capabilities

(21) Level 3: Digital Transformation

• Digital Transformation: Optimize value chains for speed and flexibility

(22) DHL Parcel API

(23) DHL Parcel API Test Call

(24) DHL Track & Trace JSON

[{
  "barcode": "3SBPB0000094346",
  "barcodes": ["3SBPB0000094346"],
  "date": "2017-11-28T23:00:00.000Z",
  "events": [
    {
      "category": "LEG",
      "leg": {"network": "DAY_DEFINITE"},
      "localTimestamp": "2017-11-29T00:00:00.000+01:00",
      "status": "LEG_REFERENCE_ADDED",
      "timestamp": "2017-11-28T23:00:00.000Z",
      "type": "LEG_EVENT"
    },
    {
      "category": "LEG",
      "leg": {
        "network": "DAY_DEFINITE",
        "reference": "60832634"
      },
      "localTimestamp": "2017-11-29T00:00:00.000+01:00",
      "status": "LEG_REFERENCE_ADDED",
      "timestamp": "2017-11-28T23:00:00.000Z",
      "type": "LEG_EVENT"
    },

(25) Level 4: API Economy

• API Economy: Experiment to find and own the most valuable capabilities

(26) API Economy Examples

• Payment service integration
• Aggregation services across various shipping services
  • Valuable for large customers looking for shipping service as a service
  • Better APIs increase the likelihood of getting integrated
• New delivery options for final delivery
  • Cars must be enabled to be remotely controlled
  • Real-time API for requesting/granting/denying access is helpful
  • Complex integration that depends on control/features of the car API

(27) API Design Deep Dive: Pull vs. Push

• DHL Tracking is a classical request/response API
  • A request is sent containing all required input
  • A response is received providing the requested information
• Pull vs. push is balancing various design considerations
  • Ubiquity: The Web's HTTP request/response protocol is widely understood and used
  • Simplicity: Client requests allow the API to ignore client state
  • Scalability: Stateless messages make it easier to scale to large client numbers
  • Delay: It's acceptable for clients to not be notified of updates
• Push tracking delivers shipment events to subscribers of the shipment
  • Clients subscribe to events by supplying the shipment identifier
  • The API manages subscriptions for shipments
  • Events are pushed to subscribers based on the client subscription

(29) From Proto-API to API

• Most organizations uses APIs in their IT landscape
  • One of the oldest variations of the theme may be file exchange/transfer
  • Point-to-point integrations created for specific integration needs
• How many of these integrations would have been useful for reuse?
  • Integrations identify connectivity that creates value
• API-enabled value chains are more valuable
  • Evolve components without the need for coordination
  • Connect new components without changes to the API provider side

(30) My First API

• Identify integration needs or potential for your current value chains
  • Some needs/potential may be realized by consuming APIs
  • Some needs/potential may be realized by providing APIs
  • Most potential is in internal flexibility (a.k.a. digital transformation)
• Start by following one of the openly available API Guidelines [http://apistylebook.com/]
• Identify potential partners (ideally more than one) to get early feedback
• Focus on developing API culture and capabilities
  • Without a strategy it's hard to make sure things play together easily
  • Without a program it's hard to make sure things get built effectively

(32) Products as APIs

• Every product must have a digital shadow (represented as API)
• Products without APIs cannot be (easily) used in value chains
• API First makes sure that product APIs are first-class citizens
  • API as UI [API as UI (1)] (product interactions are API-based)
  • Mock API [Mock API (1)] (iterate designs and gather feedback)
  • API Documentation [API Documentation (1)] (using products should be self-service)

(33) API as UI

• The API of a service is its first UI
• Every UI is layered on top of the API

(34) Mock API

• The experience of the service is (determined by) the API
• UI journeys must be translated to API interactions

(35) API Documentation

• Focus on the experience of the primary service interface (i.e., focus on DX)
• Avoid UI assumptions leaking into the API

(37) APIs Are Essential

• Digital Transformation needs an API Strategy
• API Strategy needs an API Program

(38) Thanks! Q&A

• Slides online: dret.net/lectures/hsg-cas-2019 [http://dret.net/lectures/hsg-cas-2019]
• More information about myself:
  • Twitter: @dret [http://twitter.com/dret]
  • LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/netdret [http://www.linkedin.com/in/netdret]
  • Web page: dret.net/netdret/ [http://dret.net/netdret/]