Getting Familiar With The Basics of API Implementation

Getting Familiar With The Basics of API Implementation

What Is an API?

An API is the short form of the Application Programming Interface. An API is a software intermediary that enables two applications to communicate with each other. This comprises a number of sub-routines, logs, and tools for creating the software application.

Some of the most common examples to understand API is like Amazon API, YouTube API, and Google Maps API.

The main difference in between API and Web Services:

All the web services are APIs but all the APIs are not possibly Web Services. Web Services do not contain all the specifications and cannot perform all the tasks that APIs would perform. A Web Service always needs a network to operate while API, on the other hand, does not need a network to work.

A Web Service uses only three styles to work efficiently: SOAP, REST, XML-RPC. But APIs can be exposed in any application in multiple ways.

Limits of API Usage

Many APIs have a certain limit that is usually set up by the provider. Thus, we need to estimate the amount that we can use. Getting blocked by the message that the maximum limit is reached in order to use any API can effectively reduce the usage of the API and cannot be proved beneficiary to the user.

Who Can We Use a Web API?

Web API can be used by any client which supports HTTP(HyperText Transfer Protocol) verbs such as GET, POST, PUT, DELETE. Since Web API Services do not require any sort of configuration, they can be easily used by any client. Even, portable devices such as mobiles can also easily use Web API.

What Is API Testing and What Are Its Advantages?

An API testing is a kind of software if all the developed APIs meet all the expectations regarding the functionality, reliability, performance, and security of the application.

The advantages of the API testing are:

1. Testing the core functionality: API testing provides access to the application without a user interface. This helps detects minor issues which can become bigger during the API testing. Th core and the code-level of functionalities will be tested and evaluated early before the GUI tests.

2. Time Effective: API testing usually is less time-consuming than functional GUI testing. The web elements in GUI testing must be polled which makes the process of taking the API slower. In particular, API test automation requires less code so that it can provide better and faster test coverage as compared to GUI test automation. These processes help in cost saving for the testing project.

3. Language Independent: In API testing, the data is exchanged using XML or JSON. These transfer modes are completely language-independent allowing users to select any of the code languages when adopting automation testing services for the project.

4. Easy Integration with GUI: API tests enable highly integrable tests, which particularly is useful if we want to perform functional GUI tests after the API testing.

Basic Principles of API Test Design

Here are the seven basic principles of API test design:

1. Exhaustive Testing: Testing really can be exhaustive sometimes. We don't want testing to be exhaustive, instead, we need an optimal amount of testing based on the risk assessment of the application.

2. Defect Clustering: This states that a small number of modules contain most of the defects that can be detected. Approximately, 80% of the defects can be found in 20% of the modules. By experience, we can identify such risky modules. Here, we should not repeat our style of testing every single time as this will not let us understand the complex workflow and the bugs associated with it.

3. Pesticide Paradox: The testers cannot depend on the existing techniques. They have to look continuously to improve the existing method and to make the testing more effective. But there is one thing that even after all the testing in all-new ways and approaches a tester can never claim that the application is absolutely bug-free. To understand and overcome this, test cases need to be regularly reviewed and revised and new different test cases should be added to help find more defects.

4. Testing the application repeatedly shows the presence of defects: The principle of testing states- Testing talks about the presence of defects and not about the absence of defects. Testing the software continuously reduces the probability of undiscovered defects remaining in the software. Even if we do not find any bug eventually, it does not mean the entire product is bug-free. Hence, not finding any bug is not a sign of absolute correctness.

5. Absence of error-fallacy: There can be a possibility when the application is 99% bug-free but still it is unusable. This can happen when the application is tested in the wrong environment. Software testing is not finding the defects but it also checks how much the software addresses the business needs. The absence of errors i.e. finding or fixing defects does not help if the system build is unusable.

6. Early Testing: Testing should start as soon as possible in the software development lifecycle (SDLC). So that the defects in the requirement or design phase can be captured in the early stages. it's basically cheaper to fix the defect at the earliest stage. We should start finding out the bugs as soon as the requirements for a particular function are defined.

7. Testing is always context-dependent: Testing is always context-dependent. We can test an e-commerce site in a different way than any commercial site. All the developed software's are not identical. We have to always use different methods, techniques, and different styles to test depending on the application type.

Conclusion

Basically, APi testing is used to verify if it fulfills its expected functionality, its security, performance and reliability. These tests are performed either directly or on the API or basically as part of integration testing by the developers.

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