What makes a developer portal stand out in guiding non-REST API integration journeys?
We are looking for developer portals that improve API reference documentation for a portfolio including GraphQL, asynchronous APIs, or other APIs. Success in this category means that a user is experiencing no obstacles when integrating, finding extras to speed up their work, learning how to find support if needed, and figuring out how to maintain an integration with non-REST APIs.
These developer portals serve their audience well with an engaging design, reference topics, and being creative in making the API reference documentation journey easy and discoverable.
Evaluation includes navigation, appearance, utility, how easy to use, and completeness.
Award Criteria
Questions to ask:
- How do users find relevant information regardless of API type?
- Is there sufficient organization to the information provided or is it everything and the kitchen sink?
- As a registered user, can I access information that is relevant to the API product's use?
- How does your devportal improve on basic API reference documentation from an end user's point of view?
- What special guidance is provided to ease a user’s journey into using the non-REST APIs?
- How do you support the user's conceptual understanding of the domain and processes?
- How do you provide “try it out” and sandbox functionality?
- How do you support developer needs? E.g. code examples, interactive documentation, multiple coding languages, anchor links, dark mode, easy navigation, ...
- How can users find solutions to problems that occurred?
- How do you communicate versioning and track changes?
