Part 9 Full guide
Outside services (APIs)
What an API is, how to choose an outside service and read its terms, where your app's data comes from, and how to keep the bills small.
Your app can't do everything itself. Sending an email, showing a map, looking up data, checking a photo: for each of these there are companies that offer the service through an API, and your app asks them over the internet. This part teaches you how to pick one without regret: what good looks like, what the terms really allow, what it costs per use, and what you do if the company changes its rules.
For a card app the big questions are where card names, sets and numbers come from, where prices come from and how fresh they are, who owns the card pictures, and what scanning a card with the camera really involves. Four steps in this part answer them with real options to compare. The guide never picks one for you; it shows you how to pick, and your choice feeds the next part.
- 1The services your app will need (an overview, with costs) Full guide, coming soon
- 2What an API is, in plain words Full guide, coming soon
- 3How to choose a service (a checklist) Full guide, coming soon
- 4Read the terms before you build on it Full guide, coming soon
- 5Good options for common needs (email, maps, notifications, file storage, crash reports, AI) Full guide, coming soon
- 6Card data: where names, sets and numbers come from (options) Full guide, coming soon
- 7Card prices: options, how fresh they are, and what you may show Full guide, coming soon
- 8Card pictures: where they come from and the copyright rules Full guide, coming soon
- 9Scanning cards with the camera (options) Advanced Full guide, coming soon
- 10Costs: free tiers, paying per use, and setting limits Full guide, coming soon
- 11Have a backup plan if a service changes Full guide, coming soon