Real Time Data Api
What is an API? (Application Programming Interface) | MuleSoft
API is the acronym for Application Programming Interface, which is a software intermediary that allows two applications to talk to each other. Each time you use an app like Facebook, send an instant message, or check the weather on your phone, you’re using an exactly is an API? Finally learn for yourself in this helpful video from MuleSoft, the API Is an Example of an API? When you use an application on your mobile phone, the application connects to the Internet and sends data to a server. The server then retrieves that data, interprets it, performs the necessary actions and sends it back to your phone. The application then interprets that data and presents you with the information you wanted in a readable way. This is what an API is – all of this happens via explain this better, let us take a familiar agine you’re sitting at a table in a restaurant with a menu of choices to order from. The kitchen is the part of the “system” that will prepare your order. What is missing is the critical link to communicate your order to the kitchen and deliver your food back to your table. That’s where the waiter or API comes in. The waiter is the messenger – or API – that takes your request or order and tells the kitchen – the system – what to do. Then the waiter delivers the response back to you; in this case, it is the is a real-life API example. You may be familiar with the process of searching flights online. Just like the restaurant, you have a variety of options to choose from, including different cities, departure and return dates, and more. Let us imagine that you’re booking you are flight on an airline website. You choose a departure city and date, a return city and date, cabin class, as well as other variables. In order to book your flight, you interact with the airline’s website to access their database and see if any seats are available on those dates and what the costs might ever, what if you are not using the airline’s website––a channel that has direct access to the information? What if you are using an online travel service, such as Kayak or Expedia, which aggregates information from a number of airline databases? The travel service, in this case, interacts with the airline’s API. The API is the interface that, like your helpful waiter, can be asked by that online travel service to get information from the airline’s database to book seats, baggage options, etc. The API then takes the airline’s response to your request and delivers it right back to the online travel service, which then shows you the most updated, relevant an API Also Provides Is a Layer of SecurityYour phone’s data is never fully exposed to the server, and likewise the server is never fully exposed to your phone. Instead, each communicates with small packets of data, sharing only that which is necessary—like ordering takeout. You tell the restaurant what you would like to eat, they tell you what they need in return and then, in the end, you get your have become so valuable that they comprise a large part of many business’ revenue. Major companies like Google, eBay,, Amazon, and Expedia are just a few of the companies that make money from their APIs. What the “API economy” refers to is this marketplace of Modern APIOver the years, what an “API” is has often described any sort of generic connectivity interface to an application. More recently, however, the modern API has taken on some characteristics that make them extraordinarily valuable and useful:Modern APIs adhere to standards (typically HTTP and REST), that are developer-friendly, easily accessible and understood broadlyThey are treated more like products than code. They are designed for consumption for specific audiences (e. g., mobile developers), they are documented, and they are versioned in a way that users can have certain expectations of its maintenance and cause they are much more standardized, they have a much stronger discipline for security and governance, as well as monitored and managed for performance and scaleAs any other piece of productized software, the modern API has its own software development lifecycle (SDLC) of designing, testing, building, managing, and versioning. Also, modern APIs are well documented for consumption and learn more about APIs and how to design a great API, download the eBook Undisturbed REST: A Guide to Designing the Perfect Anypoint Platform for APIs
What is a Realtime API? | Ably Blog: Data in Motion
Looking to 2020 and beyond, the proportion of data produced and consumed in realtime is growing exponentially. IDC predict that by 2025 1/3 of all data produced globally will be realtime. The engineers and organizations that make up the realtime ecosystem, Ably included, have yet to agree on how we describe the APIs we’re creating and consuming that are powering this growth. The problem is that there are various ways to describe APIs that provide realtime functionality.
API evangelist Kin Lane, and many others, have been writing and talking about these new types of APIs for a while. Event-driven seems to be the most common descriptor. Gartner has adopted the term, stating that by 2020 50% of all managed APIs will be event-driven. But still today there is no consistency or consensus between what terms like realtime API, event-driven API, or streaming API refer to. Often they’re used interchangeably.
As an engineering team and API provider working on a global pub/sub messaging platform, we work with these ideas everyday. Talking to our users we see the language they use to describe both what we do and what they achieve using our APIs. And we’ve watched discussions around event-driven architecture, webhooks, and streaming data proliferate.
Over the years we’ve thought extensively about the best terminology to use and arrived at what we call the Realtime API Family.
The realtime API family
Defining realtime
Streaming APIs
Pub/Sub APIs
Push APIs
Event-Driven APIs
What is realtime? When it comes to realtime in the context of user interaction, it can be defined as a function or interaction perceived as immediate. As a concept in this context then, realtime is easy enough to understand. Ably defines it as anything that happens in under 100ms as this is typically the threshold for perceiving something as happening immediately.
Any API designed such that data flowing from producers to consumers happens in the shortest amount of time possible can therefore be described as realtime.
Ably has settled on realtime API as an umbrella for event-driven, streaming, pub/sub, push, and other APIs. We’ve seen many more than four ways of describing this, but these are the most popular. It’s why we call it the Realtime API Family.
A stream is a means of transporting data. Streaming is a consumer pattern that describes how consumers receive events through a stream.
A streaming API will commonly address issues of data integrity with:
Message ordering – ensure messages are delivered in the order they were published
Stream continuity / resume – upon disconnection, resume from the disconnected point within a set period of time
Contiguous serial numbers – a simple series of `ACK` or `NACK` responses, each addressing a contiguous sequence of messages
Kafka offers a streaming API following this model for internal systems.
Pub/Sub (Publisher/Subscriber) is an infamous messaging design pattern. When it debuted in 1987 it solved loose decoupling of servers. The earliest distributed systems used to send events between servers using Pub/Sub, but all within reliable networks. This pattern operates by publishing messages on a topic (or channel) within a message bus, and subscribers can listen for events based on those topics.
Ably acts as a serverless Pub/Sub message bus / service layerPub/Sub is over 30 years old now. The design makes no attempt to define semantics around ordering or continuity (loss of connection). While it’s still a pattern used widely today, these are issues that must be considered and addressed in our world of unreliable connections.
Ably provides a pub/sub API following this model but with guarantees around ordering, continuity, idempotency, and more.
Ably’s unified push notifications APIPush is another umbrella term for every API that is real time. But it’s just a producer messaging pattern. It means that data is pushed upstream over a connection, versus a pull mechanism used by the request/response pattern.
An example is helpful. A push notifications API is an example of a push API. Or a sporting event might send a single score update that traverses multiple systems via push APIs, resulting in millions of messages to global fans within a few hundred milliseconds.
Push can also refer to triggering a new request as with a Webhook. Or it can mean ‘push subscription’ – i. e. a producer needs to reach out to a consumer. WebSub is an example of this. But that’s a whole other blog post.
Event-driven APIs
Organizations are shifting to event-driven to deliver the modern realtime experiences users expect. Event-driven is an architectural design pattern that defines how a system processes data. It simply states a system should be responding/reacting to events as they happen. Streaming, Pub/Sub, and Push are all messaging patterns that can delivered through an event-driven architecture. As such they can all fall under the umbrella of event-driven APIs.
Most of us know what an event-driven API is but an example never hurts. Unlike traditional request/response APIs where data is requested, event-driven APIs push data from a producer to a consumer. They can be quite simple or very complex.
An event-driven retail experienceIn the above example a retailer needs an event-driven architecture to respond to things as they happen. An event in an event-driven world triggers a chain of events which must be processed downstream, extending through the entire data supply chain. All components in this supply chain are reactive, rapidly responding to events and performing onwards processing.
The time-bound, reactive nature of this data supply chain causes increased engineering and infrastructure complexity. And when compared to REST APIs following the request/response model, the complexity is inverted and put onto API producers rather than API consumers.
The inversed complexity of REST and event-driven APIsAnd so we arrive at Realtime APIs
Streaming, Pub/Sub, and Push are all patterns that can be delivered through event-driven architecture. But the outcomes of streaming, push, pub/sub, and event-driven are all realtime functionality. They’re all means of getting data from producer to subscriber in the shortest possible time. So we can call them realtime APIs.
But you can’t have a realtime API unless it’s delivered as an event-driven, pub/sub, streaming, or push API. Hence how we’ve settled on the umbrella term of realtime API to encompass them all.
Navigating complexity and fragmentation
As you can see, it’s easy to use these terms interchangeably despite them all being different. The realtime ecosystem is still maturing and changes all the time. Eventually we believe developers and organizations will naturally come to a shared and standardized terminology for APIs designed to deliver real time functionality.
Until then, the Realtime API Family helps us to reduce complexity when we explain our cloud infrastructure and APIs to the developer community, our users, and our potential customers.
About Ably
Ably provides cloud infrastructure and APIs to help developers simplify complex realtime engineering. Organizations build with Ably because we make it easy to power and scale realtime features in apps, or distribute data streams to third-party developers as realtime APIs. We support multiple open protocols and a growing number of third-party integrations. Ready to take our APIs for a spin? Create your account for free to access all the developer resources you need or get in touch
373 Real Time APIs (2021) | ProgrammableWeb
Real Time APIs The following is a list of APIs from ProgrammableWeb’s API directory that matched your search term. The ProgrammableWeb API directory lists APIs of different types. For example, Web/Internet APIs, browser APIs, and certain product APIs. From many of our API profiles, you can find your way to related SDKs, Tutorials, and sample source code for consuming those APIs. If your favorite API or SDK is missing or you have an idea for contributing content, be sure to check our guidelines for making such contributions to ProgrammableWeb. API Name Description Category Followers Versions StockGeist StockGeist is a stock market sentiment monitoring platform. The StockGeist API enables users to monitor more than 2200 companies mentioned on social media in real-time. Methods are available to… Stocks 3 REST v1 MindTime MindTime offers a time-based framework for understanding human thinking including perception, motivation, and behavior, as well as open source digital and analogue tools that measure and map… 2 Unspecified v1 mymappi REST Location APIs such as Geocoding, Roads, Directions and Places. Turn location into human-readable addresses and viceversa, get turn-by-turn navigation instructions in all transport modes and more… Location 13 REST v1 CloudCulate The CloudCulate’s REST API provides a way to communicate with Spreadsheets in real-time and consume spreadsheet data for Google Sheets® and XLSX Files. It allows you to integrate Spreadsheet data… Spreadsheets 5 REST Prompty Server This API allows users to send notifications as well as retrieve other useful information, such as subscriber data and stats, from the Prompty web push notification service. Notifications 3 REST v1. 0 Marketstack The marketstack data service provides access to API endpoints that include; End-of-Day Data, Intraday Data, Historical Data, Tickers, Exchanges, Currencies and Timezones. This is a JSON-based REST… Financial 6 REST v1. 0 Push Technology Diffusion Cloud Diffusion Cloud provides a way to send billions of real-time messages. Diffusion is a real-time API management platform to move real-time data across the Internet and delivers data to tens of… Real Time 3 REST v6. 4 Chargetrip The Chargetrip API integrates smart, EV-specific routing into products built for drivers of electric cars.
Chargetrip gives developers access to the same powerful EV routing engine that is… Auto 3 RPC v3. 0. 1 Beetrack The Beetrack API returns delivery and logistics data. It includes routes, dispatch, vehicle, GPS, data, contacts, groups, and guide items.
Beetrack provides real-time delivery tracking for… Shipping 6 REST v1 ejabberd The ejabberd API, returns messaging data from a platform and provides server features that are robust, scalable, and extensible using XMPP, MQTT, and SIP.
ejabberd is a distributed technology that… Software-as-a-Service 1 REST v1. 0 Phenix The Phenix API Streaming 2 REST v1. 0 enables real-time stock trading information in applications connected via Websockets. Connected clients are able to access data associated with user trades, orders, subscriptions,… Cryptocurrency 5 Streaming v1. 0 PubNub Websockets PubNub is a Push technology intended specifically for high-message-volume applications and games. It is a cloud-based, real-time messaging service for mobile phones, tablets, TVs, HTML5 web browsers… Real Time 9 Streaming v4. 0 Microsoft Azure Time Series Insights The Microsoft Azure Time Series Insights API enables real-time data insights and interactive analytics in applications. The API provides the following endpoints to manage a Time Series Insights… Internet of Things 4 REST UpLead Company Name to Domain The UpLead Company Name to Domain API allows developers to convert the name of a company to its website domain and logo. The match is based on company name based on website traffic. UpLead is a B2B… B2B 1 REST v2 UpLead Prospector The UpLead Prospector API allows finding contacts and emails associated with a company, job title, job function, management level, and location. Developers can make calls to the API that will return… B2B 3 REST v2 UpLead Person The UpLead Person API returns JSON data with a person’s email address, first name, last name, location, phone number, and social links. The API retrieves data based on a domain name. B2B REST v2 UpLead Company The UpLead Company API retrieves company data using a domain name. Information includes company size, location, social links, and description. Developers can authenticate with an API Key to make… B2B 6 REST v2 Fidel UK The Fidel API retrieves global payment data in real-time. With the API, developers can implement cards, offers, locations, and transactions into applications. They can authenticate with an API Key to… Payments 1 REST v1 Fidel The Fidel API retrieves global payment data in real-time. Payments 3 REST v1 iSports football The iSports Football API provides data about more than 1400 football (soccer) leagues and cups, including matches from 110 countries. Get live scores, lineups, schedules, results, player information… Sports 24 REST v1. 0 Swim Swim provides services that allows developers to build real time streaming applications, and implements self-contained, distributed application stack in an embeddable software library. Streaming 9 Indirect Mozilla Web of Thing Websocket Mozilla Web Thing provides a WebSocket service to make multiple requests to the Web Thing API, and that allows access to notifications for Web Thing events in real time. The “webthing” WebSocket… Internet of Things 6 Streaming Index Exchange The Index Exchange API enables users to retrieve information about ad campaigns, earnings, manage data, update inventory… Advertising 1 REST Nabto Cloud The Nabto Cloud API allows developers to control one or more domains on the Nabto IoT platform. The API uses Tokens for authentication. Nabto enables remote control of Internet of Things devices… Internet of Things REST v1
Frequently Asked Questions about real time data api
What is a real time API?
What is a real-time API? A real-time application programming interface (API) is a service that enables users to automatically obtain information in real-time from one or more data resources. The API can be embedded in a software application or added to a website.
What is API with real time example?
API is the acronym for Application Programming Interface, which is a software intermediary that allows two applications to talk to each other. Each time you use an app like Facebook, send an instant message, or check the weather on your phone, you’re using an API.
Is API call real time?
They’re all means of getting data from producer to subscriber in the shortest possible time. So we can call them realtime APIs. But you can’t have a realtime API unless it’s delivered as an event-driven, pub/sub, streaming, or push API.Oct 5, 2021
