Introduction
If you are a python programmer then you might hear about API integration in python. It helps in adding features to your program easily. In real life, we use many applications that mostly work with the help of API. So now you will be thinking What is API? How it works? or How we can use it in python? Don't worry today, in this tutorial we all explain to you everything you should know about the API integration in python programming.
Let's get started with What is API?
What is an API?
API stands for Application programming interface that allows two or more applications to interact which each other. Suppose you are creating an application related to taxi services than to get the address of the passenger you will use the Google Maps API. Your application is interacting with Google Map API. Another example is When you use Facebook and sends a message to someone you are using an API.
API is basically a server that is used to retrieve or send data using specific lines of code. It is mostly used for retrieving the data and to retrieve data we have to make a request to the webserver.
The Requests module includes a function 'get' that controls the HTTP.
Also, there is a response object called JSON. It usually response body from the server and transforms it into a list of dictionaries in python.
How API Works?
To know about the working of an API here is a quick example. When you use some application on your phone the application first connects to the internet. Now from the internet, it sends data to a server. The server retrieves back the data with actions to your phone. This is how API is working and helping your mobile phone interacting with the server.
Uses of an APIs
There are several platforms where APIs are used. We are going to highlight some of the best cases where API is used to interact with data or servers.
The Data is Changing continuously
If there is a continuous change in your data for example stock price data, live population data, etc. This type of data cannot be regenerate and download again and again because it is slow and consume a lot of bandwidth. APIs are an easy method to handle this type of data.
Repeated Computation is Involved
APIs are also used to handle continuously repeating data. For example, Spotify has an API that tells you about the music. You can create your own music categories by using your own classifier but will never have much data as Spotify.
If you want to fetch small data from a larger set of data
API also helps you in fetching a part of data from a larger set of data. For example, if you just want to pull down comments from Reddit. You can easily fetch only comments with the large data of Reddit.
API Integration in Python
We all know that python is mostly used in web and other hosted applications. APIs are also mentioned as 3rd party services and are used in python to interact with different servers. Stripe used for the payment process, Social media applications used for sending messages are real-life examples of APIs integration in python.
APIs For Beginners
If you are a beginner and want to learn explore API integration in brief. Check out this video tutorial.
Resources of API Integration
Some of the programmers use requests instead of API's helper library. For this, you have to check out the tutorial on Requests to access web APIs.
There are thousands of APIs in python, which you can use in your projects and applications. You can checkout Product Hunt which provides free and commercial web APIs.
If you are looking for APIs projects, you can practice this project which will help you managing APIs easily. Build your own Pokedex with Django.
Working with APIs is an easy and creative task to interact with other 3rd party services. If you want to create a native web API client that can manage error handling then API can definitely help you out with this.
API Integration Learning
Pick one API from the internet. Read the documentation properly of your chosen API. It will help you in exploring the API more briefly.
Check whether you are working with helper library or Requests. Requests give you more control over the HTTP calls as compare to Helper libraries.
Make sure to move your API calls into a task queue to avoid the blockage of HTTP requests from your web application.
Constructing your own API library
You can create your own API library by following a few steps. Also, if you want to make API for different communities or people then also you have to learn to work with API libraries.
The structure of your API library depends upon the working and how your API authenticates. Also, instead of thinking about HTTP endpoints, you should create your own internal API easily. If you want to start building your own API library you can check out this tutorial.
Building your own API library in Python
Conclusion:
API integration briefly explained with examples and tutorials. Create your own API in just a few steps. Learn from basics to advanced .
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