Forums for the Business Analyst

 
  Modern Analyst Forums  Business and Sy...  Structured Anal...  Writing Requirements to Develop API
Previous Previous
 
Next Next
New Post 6/22/2010 12:24 PM
User is offline ivar
1 posts
No Ranking


Writing Requirements to Develop API 
Modified By ivar  on 6/22/2010 3:24:40 PM)

Writing Requirements to Develop API

How can a Business Analyst add value on project where the deliverable is API (Application Programming Interface) and NO user interface?

What kind of requirements artifacts to produce?

Any ideas appreciated?

 

 
New Post 6/22/2010 1:00 PM
User is offline David Wright
141 posts
www.iag.biz
7th Level Poster




Re: Writing Requirements to Develop API 

 

People are not the only Actors who need to interact with your system, so do other systems. It would seem that you treat one or more systems as one type of Actor whose needs are met by the API. The interesting point when it is recognized that maybe some systems need a slightly different API, or changes to the API are needed to make it flexible enough to support different Actors., and from a Requirements perspective, those are different Actors no matter how an API is built.


David Wright
 
New Post 6/24/2010 3:49 AM
User is offline Bob Savage
1 posts
No Ranking


Re: Writing Requirements to Develop API 
You can still benefit from a basic functional analysis (e.g. Use Cases) or data flow analysis (DFD). You might also want to dig deeper and do an analysis of dependencies, or document deployment practices, these things depend upon your setting. The trick is, since you won't have much variety in the types of actors, you don't want to get overcomplicated. Think about who is using the API, and how they will be using it (possibly this will generate different scenarios for common usage patterns). Then document what the various user goals would be (this is precisely a Use Case); you want to document at least the goal, and any pre-reqs, any minimal guarantees, etc. You can get away with just documenting the parameters supplied and the return type (and possibly side-effects), instead of the interaction details. Note: the parameters and the return value (and possibly side-effects) can also be viewed as the data flows if you choose to go the DFD route instead. Best of luck.
 
Previous Previous
 
Next Next
  Modern Analyst Forums  Business and Sy...  Structured Anal...  Writing Requirements to Develop API

Community Blog - Latest Posts

As Business Analysts in Agile teams, we often hear about Definition of Ready (DOR) and Definition of Done (DOD). But beyond the buzzwords, these two concepts are powerful tools to drive clarity, consistency, and quality in our work. Definition of Ready ensures a user story is truly ready for development. It answers: Is this story clear, feasible...
In today's fast-paced digital world, successful projects aren't just built on great code—they're built on clarity. And that clarity often comes from one key player: the Business Analyst. At the heart of every great product or system is a need—a business goal, a customer pain point, or a regulatory requirement. But busines...
I have always loved cooking. I learned from my Grandma June and her kitchen was her sanctuary, a small, warm sunlit space filled with jars of spices, stacks of cookbooks, and the comforting smell of something always on the stove or baking in the oven. Grandma June was as great a cook as she was a teacher to me. She never followed a recipe “to...

 






 

Copyright 2006-2025 by Modern Analyst Media LLC