The Hosting API
Voxel's Hosting API (hAPI) has been under development at Voxel Labs for the last few months, and is currently undergoing final testing with a select group of customers. Version 1.0 of the Hosting API is slated to be released by October 2008.
The goal of hAPI is to turn the functionality that Voxel has developed over the years inside out, and expose it to those of our customers with advanced needs. Through hAPI, these customers will be able to manage and monitor their Managed Servers and VoxCAST CDN service, using the programming language of their choice.
In line with our core philosophy, hAPI is built upon an open, standards based, fully documented platform. It is available to all customers at no additional charge.
Technology
hAPI is a standards-based API that is easy on developers. Here are a few details. Full documentation will be available when hAPI is released to the world; until then, if you're curious to know more, just ask!
Exchange
hAPI is a RESTful API with XML responses. (As we continue to expand hAPI, we'll make other popular exchange formats, like JSON or XML-RPC, available.) If you're familiar with the APIs of Flickr, Amazon's S3, del.icio.us, or a host of other web services, you'll feel right at home with Voxel's hAPI.
Authentication
Most hAPI methods require the customer to be authenticated. Authentication is signature-based. Signatures are computed using parameters passed to the method; a timestamp; and a shared secret known only by the customer and Voxel.
Methods
The Hosting API exposes functionality across the board of Voxel's offerings. This includes:
- Devices: provisioning, backups, metrics, monitoring
- Domains: management via Voxel's DNS servers
- VoxCAST CDN: content management (purging, cache pre-population, etc.), traffic and performance metrics, configuration, testing
with plans in the works for support and billing functionality as well.