API – What I like to call: Appreciation, Practise, Interest

Sure I know that API actually means; Application Programming Interface but I wanted to be a bit witty, and show how I became to appreciate API’s, through practise resulting in an interest.
In the lecture we discussed API’s, going into slight depth in how they worked and the purpose of them. At first I didn’t really understand the point of it and how the hell it would be useful. It did finally hit me that it can be used for good, when Max was showing us all the different examples of how people use API's to create a site. It became clear, through these examples that API’s really do allow for the combination of different services, a mash-up of data so one can create a whole new site.
The most useful site would have been the combination of Google maps and the location of the Victorian bushfires. The site allowed a clear location where the fires were situated and whether they were still life threatening to residential areas, or whether they were under control. There were other examples, although created for a bit more fun, like combining Twitter updates with Google maps, to watch as people update their Twitters from all around the world, showing the person's location.
To further appreciate the use of API’s; practise is vital. In our tutorial we used a program called Yahoo Pipes. At first it seemed that we were just creating an RSS feed but soon we were shown how to add more options and create different things with the use of API’s, like a search engine, looking up a subject from both flickr and Twitter.
With the use of Yahoo Pipes it was easier to understand how API’s could work but more importantly how they could benefit us right now, because I sure am not creating a site using API’s anytime soon, but Yahoo Pipes is a great source to help us presently in our own personal exploration in API’s and the internet.
With this practise comes appreciation for API’s, then finally an interest in further developing my skills and use of such a cool invention.