WSO2 API Manager is one of the most popular open-source, fully functional, feature-rich API Management platform which provides a rich set of tools and features for entire API-Lifecycle management including API Creation, API Publication, API Governance, APIs On-boarding, API Analytics and API Monitoring. WSO2 API manager provides various portals for API designers, API Developers and API management platform owners for creating and publishing APIs, subscribing to the published APIs and managing API management platform.

In this article, we will talk about WSO2 API Manager introduction and basics of WSO2 API manager with a WSO2 API manager beginners tutorial in video format covering how to publish APIs using WSO2 API Publisher, how to subscribe APIs using WSO2 API Developer Portal and then how to test these APIs as a client using Access tokens.

WSO2 API Manager Introduction

WSO2 API manager is an API management offering by WSO2 as an open-source product which is used to manage APIs entire life-cycle in an efficient manner. WSO2 API Manager provides separate portals for APIs publishing, APIs subscriptions, APIs Policies configuration and a separate management console to manage API management platform.

Below are the major components of WSO2 API Manager

WSO2 API Manager Publisher

WSO2 API Publisher enables API providers to publish their APIs, specify API Back-ends with LB/FT options, share documentation for APIs and manage APIs life-cycle by publishing, deprecating, versioning of APIs. WSO2 API Publisher also provides you options to define certain API policies as part of API Governance.

Publishers can publish APIs with certain plans (e.g. gold, sliver, bronze) and accordingly, limits for each plan can be defined and if APIs are monetized, monetization can also be linked to various Plans to charge clients based on the subscription model.

WSO2 API Manager Developer Portal

WSO2 API Developer Portal (formerly known as Store) acts as API-Store by providing options for application developers (consumers) to self-register, discover API functionality, subscribe to APIs, evaluate/try APIs, and interact with API publishers. Users can view existing APIs and create their own application, Products by bundling multiple APIs together into one application.

Clients can choose their subscriptions as per their needs out of available plans and if monetization is enabled for these APIs, clients will be charged accordingly.

WSO2 API Manager Gateway

WSO2 API Gateway acts as a proxy between clients and back-end APIs and it is responsible for securing, protecting, managing, and scaling API calls. WSO2 API Gateway as a proxy intercepts API requests and applies different types of policies such as throttling, rate-limiting etc. before API calls are sent to the back-end.  WSO2 API Gateway also facilitates in gathering API usage statistics which are then fed to the API analytics platform to provide useful analytical dashboards about various usage behaviours and trends.

WSO2 API Manager Key Manager

WSO2 API Key Manager is responsible for all security and key-related operations for the APIs in WSO2 API management environment. When an API call is sent to the Gateway, API Gateway internally calls the Key Manager server and verifies the validity of the token provided with the API call. If the Gateway gets a call requesting a fresh access token, it forwards the username, password, consumer key, and consumer secret key obtained when originally subscribing to the API to the Key Manager.

All tokens used for validation are based on OAuth 2.0.0 protocol. All secure authorization of APIs is provided using the OAuth 2.0 standard for Key Management. WSO2 API API Gateway supports API authentication with OAuth 2.0, and it enables IT organizations to enforce rate limits and throttling policies for APIs by consumer.

WSO2 API Manager Traffic Manager

WSO2 Traffic Manager is used to regulate APIs traffic. WSO2 Traffic manager makes APIs and applications available to clients at different service levels, and secures APIs against any security attacks. WSO2 Traffic Manager features a dynamic throttling engine to process throttling & rate-limiting policies in real-time for API calls.

WSO2 API Manager Beginners Tutorial: How to Publish and Subscribe APIs Using WSO2 API Publisher and API Developer Portal

Watch below Step by Step video Tutorial for WSO2 API Manager on YouTube channel of TutorialsPedia covering How to Publish APIs using API Publisher, How to Subscribe APIs from Developer Portal and How to Consume WSO2 APIs.

Feel free to comment below if you have any questions and don’t forget to subscribe to the channel.

Recommended Readings: API Management Best Practices

Ajmal Abbasi

Ajmal Hussain Abbasi is Integration Consultant By Profession with 13+ years experience in Integration domain mainly with TIBCO products. He has extensive practical knowledge of TIBCO Business Works, TIBCO Cloud, TIBCO Flogo, TIBCO Mashery, TIBCO Spotfire, EMS and TIBCO ActiveSpaces. He has worked on a number of highly critical integration projects in various sectors by using his skills in TIBCO Flogo, TIBCO API Management (Mashery), TCI, Tibco Designer, TIBCO Business Studio, Adapters, TIBCO EMS, RV, Administrator, TIBCO BE, TIBCO ActiveSpaces etc. Ajmal Abbasi has experience with MuleSoft ESB as well. Ajmal Abbasi is also experienced in the area of API Management particularly with WSO2 API management platforms. Ajmal Abbasi is also experienced in developing solutions using Core Java and J2EE Technologies. You can contact Ajmal Abbasi for Consultancy, Technical Assistance and Technical Discussions.

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