So far all the guides i have looked at involve communicating with a frontend client via Graphql, I wonder does it have any usage for something purely backend, such as communicating among microservices?
You can certainly make a request to the API from another server as well. Just as you can make a call to any REST endpoint from anywhere, you can perform server to server communication with GraphQL APIs as well.
For example, at Scaphold, we use Lambda for many webhooks and scheduled tasks. And from our microservice, we use the request library to make POST requests to the Scaphold server's GraphQL API.
Here's an example of a create mutation that you can use from a Node server.
Hope this helps!
Related
I want to create web app in Nextjs and in the future mobile app in React Native. But I am confused what api to use. Do you think that the Nextjs api can handle both web and mobile apps? Is this possible and is it good idea at all? Should I use PHP backend for that? Thank you very much.
With the assumption that you are talking about API Routes :
I would ask you that you think through the scale of your web and app. If this is a simple web/app that you do not expect to grow much - The NextJS API which is similar to standing up an nodejs express server is not a bad option.
Remember a few considerations when designing this API
You may have to distinguish the request origin (web/app)
CORS may have to be customized - Next exposes this
You could set an app specific route to ensure isolation or use headers to distinguish behavior if your application bifurcates in the future.
These concerns are shared even if you made a PHP, ExpresJS or any other API middleware.
Once you are past all this, i would ask you to consider
Using a GraphQL server like Apollo that works nicely with Next and is custom built for this purpose..
Evaluating API Gateways for security and scale.
You don't use any external tools at all.
Next JS has serverless model. So, you don't need to mess with BE.
You can create a number of API routes you want. in /pages/api folder. You can even split like /pages/api/desktop and
/pages/api/mobile folders.
You connect your database (MongDB, sql etc) via /middleware/your_file.js. Here is example for MongoDB
If you like, you can even add some security (ex: Auth0, next-auth
etc) to secure your API routes created in /pages/api folder. Example for Auth0
After, you can access you data througth API calls. Very good!
Im using Nuxt.js to build a frontend for some data I pull from a REST API. Now I need to call functions on a remote service, ideally via gRPC since the service has a endpoint for that.
I searched the web but I guess Im misunderstanding the whole process of creating a frontend with nuxt, since I cant find any information on that topic.
How can I, for example embed the solution provided here: https://github.com/grpc/grpc-node into my frontend?
nuxt is frontend. and the lib you are linked for backend. Nuxt dont care how you get your date, e.g. grpc or rest or anything. You need to use grpc javacsript client that work in browser e.g. https://github.com/grpc/grpc-web
I have a front end written in react and a backend API which connects to a db for getting data. They have been written separately and are different services.
The front end server has a bunch of routes that connect to the backend API and I'm wondering what are the pros / cons of having these routes instead of directly accessing the backend API?
An example of the structure:
Front end server serves index.html and browser.js.
Browser.js makes GET, POST, PUT requests to front end server.
Front end server takes these requests and then makes a GET, POST, PUT request to the backend API.
Alternative:
Front end server serves index.html and browser.js.
Browser.js makes GET, POST, PUT requests to backend API.
So what are the pros / cons of doing it either way? The prior developer before me told me they did it the first way to bypass CORS and obscure the IP address of the backend API. However that doesn't seem to me like it is worth the trouble considering all the extra code, tests, etc the front end server has to write and maintain, in addition to extra network hops. I'm wondering if I'm missing some other more crucial reason that my inexperience cannot see? (My gut says do it the second way). Note that we are in a microservices architecture .
Front end server takes these requests and then makes a GET, POST, PUT request to the backend API.
The pattern that you describe is called API Gateway and it has the following characteristics:
Benefits:
Insulates the clients from how the application is partitioned into microservices
Insulates the clients from the problem of determining the locations of service instances
Provides the optimal API for each client
Reduces the number of requests/roundtrips. For example, the API gateway enables clients to retrieve data from multiple services with a single round-trip. Fewer requests also means less overhead and improves the user experience. An API gateway is essential for mobile applications.
Simplifies the client by moving logic for calling multiple services from the client to API gateway
Translates from a “standard” public web-friendly API protocol to whatever protocols are used internally
Drawbacks:
Increased complexity - the API gateway is yet another moving part that must be developed, deployed and managed
Increased response time due to the additional network hop through the API gateway - however, for most applications the cost of an extra roundtrip is insignificant.
Conclusion: if you don't need the advantages that the API Gateway provides then you should not use it.
I am working on one school project, And my task is to make a simple api gateway, which can placed between any of the 3rd party api and the end users, tha gateway can be used for defining usage limits of the api or to do some security analysis, I am totally new to this, I know the basic concept of API gateway, but don't know how do I implement it using JAVA.
Can anyone please give me some starting point where to start implementation of API gateway?
And what are the frameworks I should use and for what purpose?
Thanks,
Nixit Patel
In a nutshell, API gateway exposes public APIs, applies policies (authentication - typically via OAuth, throttling, adherence to the the defined API, caching, etc.) and then (if allowed) optionally applies transformation rules and forwards the call to the backend. Then, when the backend responds, gateway (after optionally applying transformation rules again) forwards the response to the original caller. Plus, there would typically be an API management solution around it providing subscriber portal, user management, analytics, etc.
So basically any web service framework would work as a quick DYI solution.
You can also use plugin model of an open-source load-balancer such as NGINX.
Or take an open-source API Gateway to learn from it - e.g. WSO2 API Manager (the easiest way to see it in action is the hosted version: WSO2 API Cloud)
This is really basic.I want to implement a RESTful web API.
Now I know you can write custom applications and scripts to integrate with the API.
What I need to know:
In what languages can you write this API? C#, Java, php?
When building/programming a program that implements this API, is this the client and the software that issued the API the server? (eg. Dropbox would be the server and the custom app that integrates with the Dropbox API is the Client?
Thank you.
A REST API can be built in any programming language that allows you to handle HTTP requests (or can be attached to a Web server as a handler for requests). The two methods I've been using:
Stand-alone Windows service implementing a REST service using WCF
WEB server Apache + PHP
You are correct about the terminology. A program consuming a service is called the client, a program providing a service is called the server (while actually in the PHP approach, Apache would be the server as it is taking the request and having the script handle it).
Additional nitpicking: JQuery is not a language, but a framework to help you use some JavaScript features more easily.
On your comment Recap:
Close :-) The Client transfers JSON/XML/whatever to a server using HTTP requests. The Client can be written in any language that can perform HTTP requests.
On the server side, there needs to be some application that handles the HTTP requests (service), also written in any language, as long as it "speaks" HTTP.
The API is the definition of which operations are possible, for example, adding user accounts, getting the current time, etc. (this is what you define - what do you want your service to do?).
The JSON/XML/whatever that you transfer is the workload, the parameters for the API call. For example, if you want to add a new user to your system, the workload could be the new user name, the real name, the eMail address and some other details about the user. If the API call returns the current server time, you might not need any parameters at all, but you get back JSON/XML/whatever from the service.
The actual call being made is determined by the URL you call. For example, the URL for adding a user could be http://localhost/myrestservice/adduser and you'd perform a POST request against that URL with the required workload. For the time example, the URL could be http://localhost/myrestservice/getservertime and you'd perform a GET request against that URL.
I suggest that you read about how REST services actually work before you start, as I see some question marks on your face ;-)
Short:
API = available operations (=> URLs)
Parameters to API calls = JSON/XML/Plain Text/whatever
Client = calls the service through HTTP
Service = handles the calls, replies to client in response to HTTP requests
If you are a php programmer and familiar with Codeigniter framework then go here : Working with RESTful Services in CodeIgniter.
visit also : Rest Tutorial
First of all, you should begin with learning what is a RESTful API.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representational_state_transfer
http://www.restapitutorial.com/
http://rest.elkstein.org/
In what languages can you write this API? C#, Java, php, jQuery?
You can write an API in any language. What can help is the framework you'd be using. JQuery is not a language, but a framework for integrating Javascript application in every web browser, so it won't help.
I'd advice you to use a microframework to write your first RESTful API, because they usually are easy to use and help focus on the important (bottle/flask in python, express in javascript, silex in php, spark in java or nina in C#)
When building/programming a program that implements this API, is this the client and the software that issued the API the server? (eg. Dropbox would be the server and the custom app that integrates with the Dropbox API is the Client?
You're right, the server is providing you the service, hence the API. The client is user to that API, and implementing it into something useful.
As most of the people stated already, you can do this in just about any language.
Might I suggest that you look into NodeJS? If so, check out Restify: http://mcavage.github.io/node-restify/
There's a nice community behind NodeJS and I think it's quite open to newcomers. Just try not to pick up bad habits from JavaScript pitfalls. If you're new to programming, I'd suggest reading some intro book.
good luck!