Supporting software application developers to iteratively refine requirements for web application programing interfaces

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016239269-A1
Application number	US-201514623156-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Feb 16, 2015
Priority date	Feb 16, 2015
Publication date	Aug 18, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

Providing Web API recommendations for a context of an application is provided. A ranked list of recommended Web APIs and a set of Web API recommendations regarding the context of the application is sent to a client device via a network. In response to determining that a selection of a set of Web APIs in the ranked list of recommended Web APIs was received, the selected set of Web APIs is added to the context of the application to generate a new context of the application. A display of a relationship among the set of added Web APIs to the new context of the application is sent to the client device via the network.

First claim

1 - 8 . (canceled)

9 . A computer system for providing Web API recommendations for a context of an application, the computer system comprising:
a bus system; a storage device connected to the bus system, wherein the storage device stores program instructions; and a processor connected to the bus system, wherein the processor executes the program instructions to:
send a ranked list of recommended Web APIs and a set of Web API recommendations regarding the context of the application to a client device via a network;
add a selected set of Web APIs to the context of the application to generate a new context of the application in response to determining that a selection of a set of Web APIs in the ranked list of recommended Web APIs was received; and
send a display of a relationship among the set of added Web APIs to the new context of the application to the client device via the network.

10 . The computer system of claim 9 , wherein the processor further executes the program instructions to:
receive the context of the application from the client device via the network; receive search terms that include initial Web API requirements for the context of the application from the client device via the network; and define a Web API recommendation query that includes the search terms and selected Web APIs for the context of the application.

11 . The computer system of claim 10 , wherein the initial Web API requirements for the context of the application include at least one of an initial list of required Web APIs selected by a software application developer for the context of the application, a Web API category from which to select and recommend other Web APIs for the context of the application, full-text search terms used to search a graph-based Web API data model for other recommended Web APIs for the context of the application, and attributes corresponding to the other recommended Web APIs.

12 . The computer system of claim 9 , wherein the processor further executes the program instructions to:
send a Web API recommendation query for the context of the application to a Web API relationship engine that contains a graph-based Web API data model of Web API descriptions, attributes, and relationships; and receive a search result from the Web API relationship engine containing a list of recommended Web APIs for the context of the application.

13 . A computer program product for providing Web API recommendations for a context of an application, the computer program product comprising a computer readable storage medium having program instructions embodied therewith, the program instructions executable by a computer to cause the computer to perform a method comprising:
sending, by a computer, a ranked list of recommended Web APIs and a set of Web API recommendations regarding the context of the application to a client device via a network; responsive to the computer determining that a selection of a set of Web APIs in the ranked list of recommended Web APIs was received, adding, by the computer, the selected set of Web APIs to the context of the application to generate a new context of the application; and sending, by the computer, a display of a relationship among the set of added Web APIs added to the new context of the application to the client device via the network.

14 . The computer program product of claim 13 further comprising:
receiving, by the computer, the context of the application from the client device via the network;
receiving, by the computer, search terms that include initial Web API requirements for the context of the application from the client device via the network; and
defining, by the computer, a Web API recommendation query that includes the search terms and selected Web APIs for the context of the application.

15 . The computer program product of claim 14 , wherein the initial Web API requirements for the context of the application include at least one of an initial list of required Web APIs selected by a software application developer for the context of the application, a Web API category from which to select and recommend other APIs for the context of the application, full-text search terms used to search a graph-based Web API data model for other recommended Web APIs for the context of the application, and attributes corresponding to the other recommended Web APIs.

16 . The computer program product of claim 13 further comprising:
sending, by the computer, a Web API recommendation query for the context of the application to a Web API relationship engine that contains a graph-based Web API data model of Web API descriptions, attributes, and relationships; and
receiving, by the computer, a search result from the Web API relationship engine containing a list of recommended Web APIs for the context of the application.

17 . The computer program product of claim 16 further comprising:
filtering, by the computer, the list of recommended Web APIs for the context of the application based on the attributes of the recommended Web APIs in the list.

18 . The computer program product of claim 17 further comprising:
ranking, by the computer, the recommended Web APIs in the filtered list based on the relationships of the recommended Web APIs to the context of the application.

19 . The computer program product of claim 18 , wherein the relationships of the recommended Web APIs include at least one of common historic usage, common attributes, and matching data formats.

20 . The computer program product of claim 13 , wherein the context of the application is a set of aspects related to development and execution of the application.

Assignees

• IBM

Inventors

• Cuomo Gennaro A
• Jamjoom Hani T
• Laredo Jim A
• Natarajan Arjun
• Rajagopalan Shriram
• Williams Daniel J
• Wittern John E

Classifications

• G06F17/30864

  Physics · mapped topic

• G06F17/30604

  Physics · mapped topic

• G06F8/20

  Software design · CPC title

• G06F8/10 Primary

  Requirements analysis; Specification techniques · CPC title

• H04L67/42

  Electricity · mapped topic