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General Discussion

Anders Lund
Anders Lund
3,061 Points
Posted by Anders Lund
Anders Lund
3,061 Points

What is an API?

Hey. I never truly understood what an API is, can someone explain? thx :)

2 Answers

Krasimir Georgiev
Krasimir Georgiev
19,146 Points
Krasimir Georgiev
Krasimir Georgiev
19,146 Points

API is an abreviation for Application Program Interface and its basically a set of tools to make programming software applications easier for programmers.

Jacob Bender
Jacob Bender
15,300 Points
Jacob Bender
Jacob Bender
15,300 Points

To build on what Krasmir said, think of an API as a set of already created set of functions/classes/rules that allow you to work with other peoples software, like the Facebook Graph API, which gives you the basic framework to make calls to Facebook. Or rather, an API gives you access to an interface. See http://www.differencebetween.com/difference-between-api-and-vs-sdk/