Welcome to the API The Docs Podcast

Laura Vass, co-founder of the API The Docs conference series, hosts documentarians and other practitioners from all across the API world to discuss the latest topics, new learnings and best practices around API documentation and developer portals.

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Change management on large & complex documentation sets

21 May, 2020

On 13th May in the API The Docs virtual event Sarah Day, technical writer at LaunchDarkly, shared how you can incorporate API documentation in the big picture for overall efficiency in your organization. Riley Siebel, director of Developer Experience at C3.ai, and Mark Winberry, director of US Operations at Pronovix, presented a case study on providing a good DX with docs-as-code regardless of your system’s complexity. In the Q&A panel, they reflect on their talks and provide further insights about the following topics:

  • Do you have any advice for tech writers in a larger organization who must get buy-in at multiple levels of leadership? How do you get understanding and support from other departments to help drive advocacy when getting buy-in?
  • Have you done any research about where to host an API's docs compared to the API itself?
  • What kind of documentation tool did you use before you moved to docs-as-code?

Defining Top API Use Cases and How to Meet the Goals of Your API's Audience

13 May, 2020

On 6th May Steph Mills from Splunk shared how you can create the best possible golden paths through the API woods, and how to reduce the need for users to stray from the path into the wilds. Bob Watson from AWS explained how you're able to meet the practical aspects of customer goals with your API documentation, and how to measure how well you meet them as your API and customers evolve. In the Question-and-Answer session after their presentations, they reflect on their talks and provide further insights regarding customer oriented API documentation and API use case documentation. Enjoy!

Minimal Viable API Documentation and Developer Experience

30 April, 2020

On 22th April Mike Jang from GitLab explored what an Minimum Viable Documentation is for RESTful APIs. Jenny Wanger explained that the way you name, design, and structure your APIs has a huge impact on usability. In the Question-and-Answer session after their presentations, Jenny and Mike reflect on their talks and provide further insights. Enjoy!