Application programming interfaces (APIs) are simply interfaces for software systems to talk to one another. An API has a set of requirements that describe how applications can communicate between themselves. For years, users have been communicating with applications through user interfaces (UIs) by viewing information and requesting data from the application. APIs come into play… Read More »
As systems communicate with each other, there needs to be a structure behind what is communicated. Simple formatted text that is presented with show commands on a Cisco device will not work. However, systems can easily parse and work with data that is encoded in XML and JSON formats. JSON JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) is… Read More »
Web browsers use REST to get and post information to web servers or other systems that use HTTP. The same HTTP request methods and response codes are used. Figure 12-4 shows a create, retrieve, update, and delete (CRUD) example with a client using HTTP POST, GET, PUT, and DELETE calls along with the response codes… Read More »
Network Configuration Protocol (NETCONF) is a network management protocol defined by the IETF in RFC 6241. NETCONF provides rich functionality for managing configuration and state data. The protocol operations are defined as remote procedure calls (RPCs) for requests and replies in XML-based representation. NETCONF supports running, candidate, and startup configuration data stores. The NETCONF capabilities… Read More »
An on-change subscription streams out data only when a change in the data has occurred, such as when an interface or a neighbor relationship goes down. This type of subscription is useful for when a data value changes occasionally but the information needs to be sent in a timely manner. An on-change subscription capability must… Read More »