API designer roles and responsibilities 

Before we discuss API design goals, principles and practices, let's touch upon the primary roles of a software architect, solution architect, software designer, or anyone who's ready to take responsibility for designing RESTful APIs.

To produce successful APIs, an API designer should have or do the following:

• Be well-versed in REST fundamentals and API design best practices
• Be acquainted with API design patterns to create a modern API design
• Focus on the factors discussed in this chapter such as API design goals and best practices that can improve the application developer's experience
• Translate the business domain into several APIs by having a clear understanding of the business vision and its functions
• Closely work with API developers and help them with their day-to-day constraints and to deal with their existing legacy architecture
• Set up feedback loops that involve developer feedback sessions, prototypes, beta users, release, and versioning
• Use the feedback loops to incorporate acumens in their API design and move faster with API development
• Create best-in-class documentation, reusable code libraries, sample codes, and tutorials

Now that we understand the API designer's roles and responsibilities, let's move on to how one can design successful APIs with some of the industry API best practices in the following section.