In the Web API Basics course I learned a lot of useful information such as what an Application Programming Interface (API) is, how to use tools like Postman to send requests, identify what those requests mean, interact with REST APIs, and how to build my own APIs using ASP.NET Core.
Course reflection
This course taught me so many important key concepts and helped me understand just how important APIs are, how to use them, and even how I can make my own APIs.
At the beginning of the course, I learned about API protocols such as HTTP Requests like GET (retrieve a resource), POST (create a new resource), PUT (edit/update an existing resource), and DELETE (remove a resource). Following that, I learned about HTTP Response Status Codes such as 404 (resource not found on server), 200 (the request was successful), 503 (the server is currently down), and a few other status codes.
Next was Module 2, and in this module I learned how to interact with APIs as a client using a tool called Postman. I started out interacting by sending GET requests to open APIs to get information like song lyrics, city capitals, random dog facts, daily advice, city population data, and so much more. My first step to learning how to use APIs to obtain data.
Next, I was tasked with building an API client that reached out to NASA’s Astronomy of the Day API and obtain data from it. Using libraries such as HttpClient and Newtonsoft.Json we were able to deserialize the JSON data and display that data in the UI. This data included the title of the image, the image, the description of the image (see the image at the top of this page).
Finally, through a video course, I learned how to use ASP.NET core to create my own API for cities and their points of interest. I learned how to use a data store to hold information about these cities and their points of interest. However, that was sustainable, so I was then introduced to the Entity Framework Core. Using the EFC, we were able to call to a database server and save information, so it would remain persistent even if the API was shut down (unlike the data store, which would reset the data after shutdown).
I learned a lot during this course, and a large majority (if not all) is key information I’ll need to learn and utilize in the Software Development field. APIs are so important and power so many things we often don’t realize. I can’t wait to one day bring the skills and knowledge I learned in this course into a future career.
Zach Birrell 