I looked for APIs to do something. I found a bunch of APIs that will do the job I want. How does one pick between them when all of them will do the job in the right language/framework?
This also made me think of another question. I’ve heard of interviews for tech jobs asking people what tools they’d use to solve a certain problem. I figure the way I’d do that is exactly how I tried to find an API. Just directly look for a tool that can do your job online, see what the options are, and only click the ones that actually do what you want. I am very entry-level (recent CS grad, wish me luck) in the learn-more-by-doing stage, and am wondering if you’re expected to have a deep knowledge of most of the tools out there or what, and how one does that.
Some things to check:
- does it do what you need?
- license
- Who is behind it, company, org, some person?
- liveliness? How often is it changed, released?
- how do they handle security?
- who is using it? Community?
- cost (for commercial use)
- previous release notes, what has been changed, breaking changes?
- history, how long does it exist?
For the first question, I would base my search on things like the extensiveness of the results, authentication, pricing, usability, etc. If you don’t have any specific criteria right away, try making a few calls and playing with it to see if it will be what you needed. Some APIs I’ll find its missing this one thing that makes another api a better choice. This is something you’ll get better at with experience.
And no youre not expected to know all the tools, there are about an infinite out there. Generally youre expected to be familiar with some of the tools of the job but knowing more can’t hurt either. Take things one thing at a time and make some simple project with what you’ve learned. That’s how I do it anyways, but everyone is different.
I give up if there is no one tool but a million of them. Come back later and repeat.
Eventually just write it in python.