Preface

Who is this book for?

This book is useful for IT architects, DevOps engineers, CTOs and security experts willing to understand how to use Kong to create and expose APIs.

Even if you are not already familiar with Kong, it will only take a few minutes to create your first API.

What do you need to know prior to reading?

You don’t need to know Kong to read this book! You only need to have a basic understanding of REST, JSON and HTTP, but you don’t need an in-depth knowledge because Kong’s mission is to provide easy API publishing.

You will also need a modern browser: Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Edge or Apple Safari.

The online example

All of the code for the sample project in this book can be found at:

https://github.com/backstopmedia/kong-book-example

What will this book provide?

By the end of this book, you will understand how to:

• Use an API gateway to simplify and improve the security of your microservices architecture
• Write Kong plugins with Lua
• Deploy Kong and Cassandra in a multi-region environment
• Use load balancing features.

Book co-authors and contributors

Alex Kovalevych is an experienced web developer from Kyiv, Ukraine. Having degrees in computer science and finance, he is a polyglot web developer, constantly learning and using cutting edge technologies. He has been working on different worldwide projects in gaming and health fields.

Chelsy Mooy has been handling multiple SaaS for Finance projects as a CTO and Co-Founder of PT Thunderlabs Indonesia. She believes that well-constructed technology is a powerful “bunshin no jutsu." She lives in Malang, Indonesia with “the dog” and wears a skirt on Sunday.

Daniel Lee is a skilled engineer and is enthusiastic about tech. He really loves data science, cloud engineering, and service development. He was a former chief developer at the web community Yourssu, and now he is running a legal tech startup, Dbrain Science, in South Korea.           

Robert Buchanan is a passionate, forever learning software craftsman that picks the right tool for the right job. He is a polyglot engineer who has been in all aspects of the cycle as a UI developer, service developer, cloud engineer and performance analyst. He lives with his wife and kid in Northern Kentucky, United States.

Xavier Bruhiere  is a senior data engineer growing the Kpler team in Singapore. He has been crunching data since founding his own quantitative investment company and through startups in Paris. He loves to collaborate with smart people, visiting new countries and eating Italian delights.           

Jose Ramon Huerga Ayuso is an API Management and Microservices expert. During the 80s he was a teenage programmer and later in the 90s he earned a degree in computer science. He has been working in multiple fields, including SOA, QA, ECM, and CRM. He lives with his wife and two kids in Madrid, Spain.

Technical Reviewers

We would like to the thank the following technical reviewers for their early feedback and generous, careful critiques: Nicolas Huray and Michallis Pashidis. Thanks also to Eber Herrera, Panagis Tselentis, and Damian Czaja.