API
An API is how two systems talk to each other. Why that decides whether your packages will ever work together.
Read more →What is an integration between systems?
An integration lets two systems exchange data without retyping. What it saves and what breaks when one side changes.
What it is
An integration is a connection between two systems so data moves automatically from one to the other. An order in your webshop becomes an order in your stock system and an invoice in your accounts, without anybody retyping.
Technically that happens through the API on both sides, sometimes directly and sometimes through a layer in between that converts the data because the two systems do not use the same format.
Why it might matter to you
- It is almost always cheaper than a new system, and it solves the same problem: somebody spending hours a week retyping data.
- Every retyped line is a chance of an error. An integration removes that entire category of error, not part of it.
- It is not a one-off job. If either system changes, the integration has to follow — budget for that rather than hoping.
- An integration has to be able to fail without damage. What happens if one system is down: does it wait, or does the order vanish?
How we handle it
The question we ask most often before anything is built is which systems are already running. Often the job turns out not to be new software but an integration between two things already there, and that changes the budget by a factor.
Related terms
Web app
The difference between a website that informs and a web app people work in — and why that difference sets the budget.
Read more →Static website
A static site is built in advance instead of assembled per visitor. That makes it faster, safer and cheaper to host.
Read more →Not sure which way to go?
Send a short brief with what you have now and what needs to be better. You get an honest answer, including if that answer is that you do not need us for it.