4 ms·

Awesome - what about using API Editors (or similar tools) as a way to browse or explore an API? I've seen a lot of companies roll their own API "Explorers" to

Awesome - what about using API Editors (or similar tools) as a way to browse or explore an API? I've seen a lot of companies roll their own API "Explorers" too: https://dev.twitter.com/rest/tools/console https://dev.twitter.com/rest/tools/console https://developers.facebook.com/tools/ https://developers.facebook.com/tools/ http://products.wolframalpha.com/api/explorer.html http://products.wolframalpha.com/api/explorer.html As well as generic Rest API Explorers: http://www.getpostman.com/ http://www.getpostman.com/

anonfunction 12y ago
I regularly use interactive API documentation to test APIs. It's just so much easier than using cURL or writing a script. Most startups can't afford to spend the time and engineering resource reinventing the wheel for API documentation, especially with the "explorer" or interactive test consoles that have become so popular.
- altcognito 12y ago
  As someone who wrote one recently, it's not so hard to build the interactive testing portion as the live editing functionality. I built an API documentation site over a week's period with interactive consoles and examples. (We use WADL as opposed to Swagger or others due to legacy reasons) Live editing of API functionality? Much more complicated.
  - orliesaurus 12y ago
    whats it called? is it public?
    - illicium 12y ago
      Check out Apigee SmartDocs: https://blog.apigee.com/detail/apigee_smartdocs_introducing_smarter_api_documentation https://blog.apigee.com/detail/apigee_smartdocs_introducing_... (top level readers: sorry about the double-post)
      - anonfunction 12y ago
        Why the apigee links? We want to see what this guy built over a week.
        orliesaurus 12y ago
        sad to see the spam indeed
        illicium 12y ago
        I was assuming you or others wanted something you could actually use today.
    - altcognito 12y ago
      Sorry, it's not public and I would probably get run out of town for basing it largely on jQuery and Handlebars. (It is fast though) It looks very similar to swagger.io except everything is expanded by default and I put a very basic js search capability that filters endpoints.
  - bvanvugt 12y ago
    Cool, would love to see it if available publicly.
    - illicium 12y ago
      Check out Apigee SmartDocs: https://blog.apigee.com/detail/apigee_smartdocs_introducing_smarter_api_documentation https://blog.apigee.com/detail/apigee_smartdocs_introducing_...
  - anonfunction 12y ago
    I agree that the editing functionality is more complicated but still contend that most startups would benefit from using an existing solution. Wether that's a service or an open-source project doesn't matter so much. Here's an interactive API testing tool I made: https://github.com/Mashape/API-Test-Console https://github.com/Mashape/API-Test-Console
chatmasta 12y ago
Not precisely what you're looking for, but Django Rest Framework [1] provides web browsable API endpoints by default. The owner of the project is also working on a counterpart for Flask (no commits in 8 months though). [2] [1] https://github.com/tomchristie/django-rest-framework/blob/master/README.md https://github.com/tomchristie/django-rest-framework/blob/ma... [2] https://github.com/tomchristie/flask-api https://github.com/tomchristie/flask-api

anonfunction 12y ago

I regularly use interactive API documentation to test APIs. It's just so much easier than using cURL or writing a script. Most startups can't afford to spend the time and engineering resource reinventing the wheel for API documentation, especially with the "explorer" or interactive test consoles that have become so popular.

altcognito 12y ago
As someone who wrote one recently, it's not so hard to build the interactive testing portion as the live editing functionality. I built an API documentation site over a week's period with interactive consoles and examples. (We use WADL as opposed to Swagger or others due to legacy reasons) Live editing of API functionality? Much more complicated.
- orliesaurus 12y ago
  whats it called? is it public?
  - illicium 12y ago
    Check out Apigee SmartDocs: https://blog.apigee.com/detail/apigee_smartdocs_introducing_smarter_api_documentation https://blog.apigee.com/detail/apigee_smartdocs_introducing_... (top level readers: sorry about the double-post)
    - anonfunction 12y ago
      Why the apigee links? We want to see what this guy built over a week.
      - orliesaurus 12y ago
        sad to see the spam indeed
      - illicium 12y ago
        I was assuming you or others wanted something you could actually use today.
  - altcognito 12y ago
    Sorry, it's not public and I would probably get run out of town for basing it largely on jQuery and Handlebars. (It is fast though) It looks very similar to swagger.io except everything is expanded by default and I put a very basic js search capability that filters endpoints.
- bvanvugt 12y ago
  Cool, would love to see it if available publicly.
  - illicium 12y ago
    Check out Apigee SmartDocs: https://blog.apigee.com/detail/apigee_smartdocs_introducing_smarter_api_documentation https://blog.apigee.com/detail/apigee_smartdocs_introducing_...
- anonfunction 12y ago
  I agree that the editing functionality is more complicated but still contend that most startups would benefit from using an existing solution. Wether that's a service or an open-source project doesn't matter so much. Here's an interactive API testing tool I made: https://github.com/Mashape/API-Test-Console https://github.com/Mashape/API-Test-Console

chatmasta 12y ago

Not precisely what you're looking for, but Django Rest Framework [1] provides web browsable API endpoints by default. The owner of the project is also working on a counterpart for Flask (no commits in 8 months though). [2] [1] https://github.com/tomchristie/django-rest-framework/blob/master/README.md https://github.com/tomchristie/django-rest-framework/blob/ma... [2] https://github.com/tomchristie/flask-api https://github.com/tomchristie/flask-api