API Version 1.2 Released

Extensibility
1

We’ve made a relatively minor update to our API that seeks to address a few issues with our JSON implementation.

The JSON API works as a proxy layer above the original XML API by converting request and response payloads into and out of XML. This enabled us to support JSON transactions without significantly refactoring large chunks of our code-base.

The approach we initially used for XML/JSON conversion resulted in JSON output that was compliant but not always sensitive to strict JSON data formatting conventions.

The 1.2 update will therefore address the following issues.

  • Correct handing of arrays. Single item responses (i.e. a client_search returning one match) will now correctly encode the response into a single member array.

  • Agnostic to order of elements. The underlying XSD schemas were forcing elements to be presented in a strict order. We’ve now modified these schemas to allow items in the request to be presented in any order.

  • Correct formatting of data types. The original JSON API returned all values as strings, this makes it difficult to create models from the response in the target application without performing additional conversions and casting.

To invoke version 1.2 of the API simply set the version in the endpoint as follows:

https://api.quickfile.co.uk/{API_Version}/{Namespace}/{Method}

e.g.

https://api.quickfile.co.uk/1_2/Client/Update

We’ve also added a menu to invoke the new API from the sandbox:

Finally we’ve updated all our request XML and JSON examples in the API documentation site. We’ve also now added corresponding example responses in the updated documentation.

That’s it for now, if you’d like to discuss any points regarding to these changes just hit reply.