Software is an unique product in that it can be multiplied with minimal cost. Once the development has been footed, adding new installations tends to be an issue of purchasing extra hardware. Google has used this very approach to produce a variety of APIs, providing web designers access to building
blocks used for the realisation of its own services. Some of them are, fortunately for us, made available for free: Google willingly foots
the bill in order to tie developers closer to its own ecosystem.
In addition to the eventual introduction of monetisation (well-established APIs tend to stop being free when enough people use them), Google furthermore profits from the ability to get its APIs stress-tested by third parties without
needing to pay them for their work. Another, possibly more sinister, benefit
though involves additional access to customer data. If a website generates graphs and other features using Google’s services, then the search engine can track user movements and site retention times more efficiently. It would not surprise us if this data somehow found its way into search engine rankings. For example, a scammer with a well-placed but content-poor website could give himself away via the very short visit duration. But let us throw caution to the wind for now though – in all fairness, the possibilities offered are far too great for us to simply pass them up. Look forward to effortlessly creating diagrams
and graphs, handling sign ins automatically, renting databases on an as needed basis over the next few pages in our list of top APIs. If you can name it, it’s likely that Google already has you covered. Mobile AMP pages.
Making users sign in is a sure-fire way to lose them: creating a new account is an extraordinary level of hassle. Many users will simply switch off or close the tab at the sight of such a page – they want to get content there and then, without having to wade through username and password boxes. But by using Google’s sign-in system, we can mitigate the problem by permitting users
to log in with their already available Google account. Getting started with most
Google APIs requires you to sign up for an account in the Google Developer’s console (http://console.developers.google.com). Next, create a project and open the subsection APIs&auth and click the Credentials subtab. Then,
create an Auth ID. If you created a new project, the Developer Console will now ask you to configure the Consent screen: the information entered here will be displayed to the users as your app authenticates. Then, you just have to create a client ID for a web application – don’t forget to fill out the authorised URL fields with your testing and deployment URLs in order to prevent Google from blocking the app. Google will then reward your efforts by generating a client ID
and a client secret. In the next step, a test must be hacked up. Its structure is relatively simple – it loads a script, and runs an on SignIn-Method when the login process is completed.