

Ask HN: Best approach for adding an API to an existing rails app - davejazz

Hey, built this prototype game http://www.vvx.io/ - think it could be fun to allow API access so people could create bots that trade on the exchange. (e.g. scrape reddit for youtube videos, seed and buy/sell them onto the exchange.)<p>VVX.IO was my first full end-to-end just-me programming experiment. I was up until this a front-end and product guy (don't even code in my day job - the game is a part time labour of love) - so approaches to an API are new to me - there seem to be <i>a lot</i> of options and guidelines out there for offering APIs - from 3rd party services (mashape) to best-practice on auth etc. -  what would you guys recommend as a good place to start?<p>Thanks a lot!
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masonhensley
Here are a couple of tutorials which may get your brain juices flowing...

<http://railscasts.com/episodes/322-rabl?view=asciicast>

[http://railscasts.com/episodes/352-securing-an-
api?view=asci...](http://railscasts.com/episodes/352-securing-an-
api?view=asciicast)

[http://railscasts.com/episodes/348-the-rails-api-
gem?view=as...](http://railscasts.com/episodes/348-the-rails-api-
gem?view=asciicast)

~~~
davejazz
Cool. Thanks man.

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benkant
Make sure you give RocketPants a look:

<https://github.com/filtersquad/rocket_pants>

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maxstoller
Check out Grape. (<https://github.com/intridea/grape/>)

