Tom CardenMy comfort zone is js/node, and I’ve got a working prototype built with Fastify with some of the OpenAPI plugins. I like the way I can define my API and schema and then instantly plug in to the OpenAPI ecosystem (RapiDoc, Swagger UI, Stoplight, Postman…)
I’ve gone implementation first (ie I made working endpoints and then described and validated them with a schema, and then autogenerated docs). I see many tools (Postman etc) that focus on design/docs first but that seems like it solves a problem I don’t have, and makes new ones?
The ecosystem is dizzying though. To get from prototype to production I know I want to add API keys, rate limiting, etc and later I may want more sophisticated quotas, billing, bot detection etc.
All the cloud players have big complex and pricy offerings that solve some of these problems (but may add more), e.g. Apigee, Azure API gateway etc. Smaller and open source players here are very interesting: e.g. Zuplo, Tyk, Kong etc.
The docs space is equally dizzying: there are classy looking products that only solve a narrow slice of the problem. e.g. Readme.com is slick, but to use their analytics you have to send them data. They don’t solve for API key management or other gateway pieces at all.
Open source solutions like API Umbrella can solve the whole thing, but with less polish, no SLAs, and taking on responsibility for someone else’s esoteric stack choices. I have enough trouble with *my* esoteric stack choices :)