If your product depends on your own internal API, or if your primary customers are users who use your API, then you need to know when your API’s performance is experiencing problems. In my last post I described how you can use the API Science Uptime Report to address an unexpected massive outage related to […]
Continue readingGlobal Monitoring
What to Do when a Massive Cyber Attack Brings Down APIs
In mid-May, a massive global cyber attack was executed that affected major companies in more than 150 countries. Major victims of the attack included Britain’s National Health Service, “causing widespread disruptions and interrupting medical procedures across hospitals in England and Scotland.” Other major victims included Spain’s Telefonica, Deutsche Bahn (Germany’s national railway service), French carmaker […]
Continue readingUsing the Weekly API Science Report to Improve Customer Experience
Your API Science account automatically provides you with the “Weekly API Science Report” which is delivered by email to the email address associated with your account. Here’s an sample email for an account that runs two API Science monitors: The report proceeds from a performance overview for all of your monitors down to the details […]
Continue readingTiming-Out Slow-Performing External API Requests
API performance varies depending on many variables, including the response of the Internet (for example, resolve time and transfer time) and the timing for work that occurs on the remote server (connect time and processing time). My last post illustrated that calls to the World Bank Countries API sometimes exhibit abnormally slow performance. Unpredictable, though […]
Continue readingAPI Performance as a Function of Call Location
Some weeks ago, I created API monitors that call the World Bank’s Countries API from four different locations: Ireland, Oregon (U.S. West Coast), Tokyo, and Washington, D.C. (U.S. East Coast). All four monitors request the World Bank information for Brazil. Here’s a recent view of my API Science Dashboard for these monitors: Each monitor is […]
Continue readingAPI Performance Outliers Based on Location
Monitoring API performance from various locations around the world is critical in order for you to know what your global customers are experiencing. The “Weekly API Science Report” that you receive with your API Science membership provides a good summary of the status of the APIs you are monitoring. A week ago, for my post […]
Continue readingWhy Location Matters in API Performance Testing
In his 2014 book Flash Boys, Michael Lewis talks about a massively expensive project that burrowed through mountains, tunneled under riverbeds, dug trenches beside country roads, with the objective of creating “maybe the most insistently straight path ever dug into the earth” between Chicago and New Jersey. Why? So that “a one-and-a-half-inch-wide hard black plastic […]
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