Member-only story
APIs Explained Simply… Like It’s Your TV Remote!
As we get further into the 2020s, APIs are becoming more and more relevant. But how do you explain them to your friends, coworkers, or mom? With a metaphor of course!
For those of you who know me, I’m an API guy. They’re kind of my thing. I blog about them regularly, give talks at conferences, and even talk about them on podcasts.
They are the building blocks of software. The heart of integrations. The keys to our future. We need to spread the word about how great they are. But not everybody understands technical talk.
Every article I’ve read about APIs first describes them as an Application Programming Interface. While that might be what the acronym stands for, that doesn’t go very far when it comes to explaining what it actually is.
Super high level, an API lets you do things in software that you may or may not be the creator of. To understand this a little further, let’s bring in a concept everybody knows: tv.
Give Access to Basic Functions
A tv has well known and established controls:
- Power on and off
- Volume up and down
- Channel up and down
- Change Input
Every tv you purchase today will have these controls. You can do all of these commands via a tv remote. You can use the remote that comes with the tv or you could purchase a different one instead.
The remote control will use the established commands to control the tv from the comfort of your couch. You just point and click.
This is how APIs work.
A piece of software has known and established features (the API). Software companies provide documentation on what features are available and how to use them. Integrators build software of their own to communicate with the API to make it do what they want.
In this metaphor the software is the tv, the API is power on/off, volume up/down, etc.., and the integrators are the tv remote.
