04. APIs

Getting Data

We've looked at the concepts of Ajax and that it's the technology we'll use to add data to our project asynchronously. But where is this data coming from? And how do we get access to it? How will our app know how to retrieve that data?

We'll be using an API to interact with various data sources.

What's an API?

The acronym "API" stands for:

Application

Programming

Interface

There's data out there that's just waiting to be used. Most of the data-rich applications you use get their data from 3rd party websites. They actually fetch this data using APIs. In the video below, Cameron will demo how Reddit uses APIs for added interactivity on its site.

Google's APIs

All the Google services you can imagine.

Giant database of APIs

This is definitely worth skimming for some inspiration.