Request Integration

What's integration?

Modern distributed systems span multiple components implemented across the globe, which must communicate with each other for the enterprise to work as a whole. These systems are developed independently by different, often unrelated parties. We can’t just plug and play such APIs into our application. Integration is the term used for a collection of tools and techniques for connecting such systems.

An important component of such integration is data mapping. The information content of the API request from the caller is roughly the same as the information required to execute the API. Similarly, the information content of the response is what the API call requires (that’s why we use the API). However, we have a mismatch in the data format carrying this information on either side. The data format expected by the API differs from the format the caller expects.

API Gateway provides a strong framework for bridging such a mismatch. API Gateway provides several different types of integration with services in and outside of AWS. This chapter covers the data mapping required for such integration.

Types of integration

When we define request integration with API Gateway, we have only three logical options.

• We can integrate with an API inside AWS.

• We can integrate with an API outside of AWS.

• We can process the request within the API Gateway.