Google released some updates to its API ecosystem the other day with a new release of
Google Custom Search API. Google also rewrote a bunch of
API documentation and more importantly released an
API console for managing your Google APIs.
I can't tell you how many Google APIs there are, let alone how many of them I use for personal or business. I think Google is having trouble keep track of the API sprawl itself, and is moving to provide its users with tools to manage their API usage confidently.
The Google API Console allows you to create API Projects and activate different Google APIs underneath these projects. Within a project you can:
- Activate APIs - Select which APIs are used within a project.
- Team - Manage which users have access to a project
- Traffic Controls - Tools that allow you to limit requests to specific IP Addresses, and define how many calls they can make
- Traffic Reports - Analytics showing how number of requests and referrers.
- Keys - Allows you to issue individual keys for different API consumers within a project.
Google API Console provides some much needed to tools to help users better integrate their applications with Google Services. It also goes further to help developers use Google Web services as a platform for building and deploying applications to different users' groups and clients.
Google API Console is only available for a limited number of Google APIs currently, although Google promises more APIs to come. The tools it provides are reflective of the tools provided by API Service Providers such as Mashery, 3Scale, and Apigee.
APIs are rising in number within Google and across all industries, and as such, the need to manage access and security and to measure usage is only going to grow.
