{"id":24448,"date":"2020-10-27T06:49:03","date_gmt":"2020-10-27T06:49:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.topdesk.com\/en\/?p=24448"},"modified":"2025-05-14T12:47:55","modified_gmt":"2025-05-14T11:47:55","slug":"importance-apis-with-examples","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.topdesk.com\/en\/blog\/importance-apis-with-examples\/","title":{"rendered":"The importance of APIs – and 3 TOPdesk API examples"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a day and age where the average business\u00a0reportedly<\/a>\u00a0uses more than 1,000 individual applications, it\u2019s more important than ever before to make sure that they\u2019re all integrated. That\u2019s where APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) come in.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ve probably already heard of APIs before. APIs are crucial to running forward-thinking organizations\u2014their wide-ranging benefits will help make your business more efficient, more connected, and more successful.<\/p>\n

Throughout this piece, we\u2019re going to explore what APIs are, why they\u2019re beneficial, how APIs can be used, some examples of solutions that have been developed with APIs, and what we have planned for the TOPdesk API going forward.<\/p>\n

What Is an API?<\/h2>\n

According to multinational software company Red Hat<\/a>, a subsidiary of IBM, an API is \u201c… a set of definitions and protocols for building and integrating application software.<\/em>\u201d APIs essentially allow data to be transmitted between different software products. But as well as allowing different pieces of software to speak to each other, APIs also define how this occurs: the requests that can be made between systems, how to make them, the data formats to use, and more.<\/p>\n

Imagine that your company is reaching the end of its financial year and wants to pay out bonuses to its staff. Departmental managers meet with the executive team to decide who\u2019s going to receive one and how much they\u2019ll be paid. This information is then relayed over to the HR team, who put this down into their all-encompassing employee management system.<\/p>\n

However, it won\u2019t be the HR team who actually go ahead and pay out these bonuses\u2014so their system will have to be linked to your finance department\u2019s payroll software. And how do you ensure that this information is successfully shared across these two systems? With the help of an API. The right API will allow both the HR and finance team\u2019s software to speak to each other, with payroll automatically updating based on changes made to the employee management system. Or perhaps the HR and finance team both use an API to create custom reports (using their business intelligence software), before sharing these with their departmental managers and the executive team.<\/p>\n

The right API will allow both the HR and finance team\u2019s software to speak to each other.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Why Are APIs So Beneficial?<\/h2>\n

Modern organizations rely upon a vast network of software and applications. Each individual department will have their own ever-expanding ecosystem of tools, all of which serve a different purpose but are critical to the smooth running of your business.<\/p>\n

Technology\u2019s great, but it can be frustrating when your different systems work in silos. You have to manually share data from system to system and you\u2019re never sure if what you\u2019re seeing in one piece of software is accurate and up-to-date. That\u2019s why integrations are so important. However, not all integrations are created equal\u2014\u201cpoint-to-point\u201d integrations (where you custom code integrations for each individual system) can be time-consuming and error-prone.<\/p>\n

If your organization relies upon a wide range of tools to function, you need API-led integration.\u00a0According to CoForge<\/a>, APIs lead to \u201cgreater flexibility, governance, speed and reusability.\u201d Such reusability is crucial\u2014it means that one API can be used for different purposes, including integrating with different systems.<\/p>\n

APIs can make your organization drastically more efficient.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As a result, APIs can make your organization drastically more efficient. Once you expose one piece of software\u2019s functionality in a standardised language, you can then use this information to facilitate integrations with other systems.<\/p>\n

Imagine you use an API to integrate\u2014and share data with\u2014another internal tool. Both pieces of software will become more valuable to your end users as they\u2019ll now have access to a wider range of up-to-date business data. Once that takes place at scale, you\u2019ll begin to run an interconnected organization where information- and knowledge-sharing is embedded into everything that you do.<\/p>\n

But don\u2019t just take our word for it.\u00a0According to the Mulesoft 2020 Connectivity Benchmark Report<\/a>, organizations that embrace APIs see significant increases in productivity, agility, and innovation\u2014all while significantly decreasing their operational costs.<\/p>\n

3 Examples of TOPdesk APIs<\/h2>\n

Now that we\u2019ve covered what APIs are and why they\u2019re beneficial, let\u2019s dive into three APIs that we\u2019ve specifically developed to help TOPdesk customers.<\/p>\n

1. Incident Management API<\/h4>\n

Our general API mainly deals with incident management. Among other things, you can use it to exchange tickets with your suppliers (including\u00a0ServiceNow<\/a>,\u00a0Jira<\/a>, and\u00a0Zendesk<\/a>), as well as sending bills to your customers by sharing key data with your bookkeeping application (thanks to our integration with\u00a0Exact Online<\/a>). Display information from incidents on a big screen and integrate with\u00a0WhatsApp<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Microsoft Teams<\/a>\u00a0to bring all communication channels within the TOPdesk platform\u2014making life significantly easier for your entire team.<\/p>\n

2. Reservation Management API<\/h4>\n

Our reservation management API is fantastic at enabling organization-wide facility management. It\u2019s plays a crucial role in a number of our marketplace solutions, such as the\u00a0Room Reservation Screen<\/a> solution to have screens displayed outside meeting rooms show when the room has been reserved, and GoBright Room Booking<\/a>, which allows you to find, and book, available meeting rooms from your phone.<\/p>\n

3. OData API<\/h4>\n

Our\u00a0OData API, unlike the other three listed above, is used primarily for the sake of reporting. By integrating with Power BI, you\u2019re able to quickly produce comprehensive reports that leverage data spread across a myriad of different tools and different systems. In a world where having the ability to make quick, data-led decisions is more important than ever before, our OData API is the perfect solution for your organization.<\/p>\n

What the Future Holds for TOPdesk APIs<\/h2>\n

The\u00a0TOPdesk API<\/a>\u00a0makes our functionality available for automation and integration. It will help you create a smarter, more interconnected organization, and will allow you to get the best out of all the tools at your disposal.<\/p>\n

However, that doesn\u2019t mean that it\u2019s finished\u2014in fact, far from it. We\u2019re actively working on improving the API\u2019s consistency and trying to use it to expose even more of the TOPdesk functionality.<\/p>\n

For instance, we\u2019re currently working on further developing our operations management API, which allows users to create and update operational activities within TOPdesk. Our newest updates will enable users to leverage action sequences to automate customer-specific processes, as well as facilitating integrations with long-term maintenance solutions.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re also working to improve the performance of the OData feed. This will allow you to make more accurate, more comprehensive reports, quicker than before. What\u2019s not to love?<\/p>\n

Want to start using APIs?<\/h2>\n

On\u00a0our TOPdesk API page<\/a>\u00a0we provide you with everything you need to know to get the most out of our APIs. You’ll find:<\/p>\n