OpenAPI and HTTP/2
Usage Engine workflows are of course not limited to HTTP traffic and RESTful interfaces. You can build micro service type of architectures using any IP based protocol, or even file IO. However, as cloud native computing (including telco 5G architecture) is becoming increasingly standardized, many interfaces are converted to use HTTP(2) as the communication protocol and OpenAPI as the API definition language.Â
Usage Engine natively supports OpenAPI and HTTP/2 and integrates natively with JSON in the processing language APL. This makes it straight forward to build, connect and manage the lifecycle of workflows that use these standards. Using HTTP(2) as communication protocol also gives seamless integration with many tools within the CNCF (Cloud Native Computing Foundation) ecosystem like Istio service mesh, Jaeger for distributed tracing etc.Â
By combining OpenAPI specifications with workflow packages to allow you to run multiple versions of a workflow in parallel and with ECDs and Ingresses to enable exposing different interface versions on difference URL paths, you have the necessary tools to support API lifecycle control.Â