Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) are foundation on which a sustainable & profitable digital economy builds. APIs have revolutionized digital interactions. Today, when customers want to engage with different brands and companies on a variety of devices and channels, it is essential for IT organizations to drift towards efficient and agile development frameworks that offer a quick and diverse mix of connected experiences.
What is API Management?
API Management encompasses process of creating & publishing web APIs, enforcing their usage policies, controlling access, & nurturing the subscriber community. Furthermore, it aids in collecting and analyzing usage statistics and reporting on performance.
API management empowers a business to view and have control over the APIs that interconnect applications and data across the enterprise and across clouds. In addition, its component provides mechanisms and tools that support both- the developer and subscriber community.
Software that allows users to monitor, control and monetize the APIs in a secure environment is API Management Software. The administrators can check out the connection consistency, traffic, errors, and security of their published APIs with the help of API Management software.
The post-production phase of an API’s lifecycle uses this tool from where the entire maintenance, monitoring, and management related to the API occurs within the API management product.
Components of API Management Solutions
To flourish in the digital world, businesses need to keep pace with the competitors and meet customers’ rising expectations for digital interactions. In order to accomplish these requirements, API management solutions must manage and control the full lifecycle of API usage and deliver a complete end-to-end set of services.
The essential components of API Management Solutions are discussed below in brief-
1. API Catalog
A unified API catalog is the central or the core component wherein all the APIs are listed and become easily browsable. Offering support to all API lifecycle changes, the API catalog also ensures connectivity to third-party catalogs. It also offers advanced API monetization mechanisms.
2. API Client Registry
It extends the applications and functionality of the API Catalog and comprises a complete list of consumers and permission of all APIs. It helps in organization registry, application registry, and app developer registry so that developers can manage and get access to their respective set of APIs.
3. API Developer Portal
It is a communication channel between the developers and the API Product Manager. The portal assists the developers join an API community that helps them discover, consume, build, and test APIs. It boosts the adoption of APIs.
4. API Gateway
It is an API Gateway that secures, checks, and controls all API calls and proxies the API traffic. When deployed in the internal network, it also acts as an API composition layer. Thus, a scalable API Gateway can accept and route large volumes of traffic smoothly without hindering performance.
5. API Policy Editor
It is an essential component of an API management solution that develops policy for integration and security teams. The function of API Policy Editor is to allow establishing policies for conversations and modifications of API calls.
6. API Creation Tool
Addressing the needs of digital development teams, API Creation Tool is dedicated to developing the digital world. It combines multiple APIs into optimized APIs. Also, it works on leveraging the enterprise APIs by combining them with 3rd party APIs.
Conclusion
With an ever-evolving digital world and outburst of apps, the need for optimized, secure, and relevant digital interaction has become the call of time. Therefore, working on solutions that provide customer-centric solutions is essential. Efficient API management software manages, control and monetize today’s APIs and API-driven businesses for a successful outcome.
Keen to know more about API management, how they work, and the best API management software? Visit vBridge Hub now and get the answers to all your queries!
