Business of APIs - October 19, 2011

Developers Need Love Too

Wednesday, October 19, 11

Building a hacker community in the US

• Andrew Mager• @mager, @SpotifyPlatform

• Employee #5 at SimpleGeo: https://simplegeo.com/

• Moved to NYC a month ago from San Francisco to work at Spotify

• Languages of choice: Python, Ruby, HTML5, CSS, Javascript

• 1-year-old puppy, Sam:

Wednesday, October 19, 11

API best practices

Assume your users know nothing about APIs. When working with cloud APIs, explain what the cloud is. Give high level overview of REST, HTTP.

Be clear about what’s supported and what is not.

Explain how a user authenticates with your API.

Talk about what services your API plays nicely with.

Be attentive to feedback. Relay that feedback to your team. Circle back with the developer.

Have an collaborative internal FAQ that you can constantly reference, update, and learn from.

Join every social media service (especially the developer-focused ones like Github and StackOverflow). Make sure to create a separate Twitter account for your developer community: @SimpleGeoAPI, @SpotifyPlatform

Be available to answer questions. When developers get in touch with a human, they feel really good.

Be active on your developer forums. I prefer Google Groups.

Wednesday, October 19, 11

The art of the demo

Show your users how to use your API. Give them real-world examples.

Apigee Console - https://apigee.com/console/simplegeo

Mashery I/O Docs - http://spotify-iodocs-565650870.us-east-1.elb.amazonaws.com/

Github gists are your friend.

Codecasting is legit.

Office Hours.

Sponsor hackathons, meetups, conferences. Spend money.

Wednesday, October 19, 11

Have a really badass developer website

https://dev.twitter.com/

http://developers.facebook.com/

http://developer.apple.com/

Build an outline of your website that includes latest blog posts, commits from Github, Tweets, upcoming events, tutorials, and documentation.

Get a technical editor.

Merge & showcase community code.

Wednesday, October 19, 11

Find great examples of apps built using your API

There are dozens of apps and utilities using the Spotify Platform.

• Spotibot - playlist generator

• Spotify Chrome extension - Scan webpages for Spotify content

• The Mac Box - Use Mac IR remote to control Spotify

• spo.tl - A Spotify URL shortener

• Fuck Yeah Spotify - Top tweeted Spotify albums of the day

• EchoFi - Give an artist and it will play songs you might like on Spotify

• FreshSpotify - Emails you when new music comes out from your favorite bands

• Stalkify - Give it a Last.fm username and it will give you Spotify links for all of your favorite music

• Spotify Applescripts - Control playback with custom Applescripts/keyboard shortcuts

Wednesday, October 19, 11

Follow @mager & @SpotifyPlatform

Wednesday, October 19, 11