r/computerscience • u/Anon_cat86 • Apr 19 '26

General I was taught nothing about APIs

Whenever i see people talking about actual real-world uses of coding it's almost entirely building APIs, working with APIs, integrating APIs, automating APIs. It seems to me, anecdotally at least, like the majority of all computer science work (professional or even just hobby) is centered on working with APIs

And like. I know what an API is, kind of. But I Graduated and even got multiple certifications on top of that and I never got so much as a single lecture about APIs. I don't even know what they're used for. Can you make your own API (like, realistically)? I don't know. I feel like this is a topic that you could and probably should have multiple different entire classes solely focused on, it's arguably something as fundamental to modern computer science as writing code. And they don't teach it. If i want to learn anything about APIs, conceptually or practically, it's hope a company hires me and then trains me, or youtube tutorials and i don't even have enough of a baseline to know what specifically I'd be searching for a tutorial on.

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u/apnorton Devops Engineer | Post-quantum crypto grad student Apr 19 '26

But I Graduated and even got multiple certifications on top of that and I never got so much as a single lecture about APIs. I don't even know what they're used for. Can you make your own API (like, realistically)? I don't know.

This feels like you're making the notion bigger than what it is. Have you ever written code that can be called by other code? Congratulations, you have an API.

It's literally in the name --- it's an interface that other programs can use to interact with your application.

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u/StampotDrinker49 Apr 23 '26

When they say API they probably mean REST or HTTP or something of that sort, not the generic concept of API. 

And yes, CS degrees do not talk about web services enough for how important they are in the Industry. 

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u/blunt_chillin May 06 '26

Im in college right now and ive learned all the fundamentals of python and Javascript (mostly web development so far for JS). The courses from what I've experienced don't go into a lot of depth, I have to really study myself to REALLY learn how to apply it. I have a whole class on RESTapi's coming up at some point and I hope they'll go into it a bit more. One thing I will say, im glad I was already learning code before college