In our previous blogs we have explored and understood What is an API, What are the different types of API’s( REST , SOAP ) and What are the three pillars of REST API. In this blog we would understand how Mulesoft is helping companies to overcome complex integration challenges .
Let's begin with a sample scenario !
You are the CEO of a company called “MuleSneakers” ! Ofcouse everyone likes sneakers & especially the limited , rare ones ! Right ?! Your company is doing quite well & have received a great response from the customers ! As days go on you have started to sell your sneakers on a Ecommerce platform as well & based on the recommendation from your company’s CTO ( Chief Technical Officer ) you have onboarded Salesforce to manage your Sales & Service Process , SAP for Inventory management .
Now let’s summarize which systems are involved in driving your business & what kind of data would they contain
The Administrator & sales team are not able to manage the operations & leading to loss to customers ! The team reaches out to the CTO & you for help ! You then decide to integrate Salesforce - SAP - Ecommerce system ! A team of well skilled developers develop an application that integrates all the three systems ( Refer the below Image ) !
You have successfully integrated all three systems & your team at Mule Sneakers are now able to carry out their respective operations!
Now if you are all ready to expand your business & have decided to develop a Mobile application for Mule Sneakers! But wait, the already developed APIs are not feasible to be used for Mobile Applications So a new API needs to be developed specifically for mobile & none of the previous development that was done can be used! The developers at Mule Sneakers who were previously involved are no longer part of the organization!
You as a CEO are finding it difficult to manage the Integration between the applications & thus losing out on potential customers!
By using Mulesoft you can overcome these challenging bottlenecks !?
Mulesoft had come up with an approach to Integrate multiple systems seamlessly called ‘The API led Connectivity’
Hearing API-led Connectivity for the first time?
API led Connectivity is an approach where instead of building a single application you develop reusable assets !
API led Connectivity has 3 different layers namely
Starting with System API’s at the bottom , These API’s are primarily developed to access data present in External systems such in the case of Mule Sneakers where data exists in SAP, Salesforce & Ecommerce System .
At Process API - Once we have access to the data at the process layer you transform & enrich the data based on the needs of the businesses
The Experience layer on the top is customized to deliver a delightful end-customer experience.
Now instead of building a single application you can create reusable API assets & use these assets wherever necessary !
So according to the Mule Sneakers use case 3 separate System API would be created 1 each for SAP, Salesforce & Ecommerce system.
At Process API you can use the System API to access the data & process them accordingly!
The experience API layer is where the developers or any other external applications, who have valid access can consume the API’s
I use Salesforce and Mulesoft to build products for amazing Customer Experience!
I have extensive experience working in the Salesforce ecosystem, with a focus on integrations. I am a Mulesoft Certified Mentor and have worked on Mulesoft's Anypoint Platform & Studio, Mulesoft Composer & Mulesoft RPA, Salesforce Apex, Lightning Flows, Aura, and Lightning Web Components. I have also developed applications with Heroku, VanillaJs, ReactJs, NodeJs, NoSQL databases such as MongoDB, and State Management tools such as Redux.
