The 10 Most Advanced QA & Testing Companies of 2019 QA & Testing-compressed | Page 33

Jan van Eck
CEO & Co-founder
Sport Engineers
Putting data at the core of your design
These days, any club can have a responsive website online
using WordPress or other solution within the hour. The
equivalent applies for a variety of solutions that provides
online payment or registration. Instead of developing or
licensing a software solution that competes with this fast-
growing technologic evolution, sports organisers should
embrace it by allowing their stakeholders to use different
software solutions.
By looking at the essence of its’ organisation, defining
which data is most relevant and therefore a necessity to gain
control of, and which data may easily be mastered and
obtained from other vendors, sports organisations are able
to make much more efficient choices.
Knowing that data is obtained by input, not a list of
software features or functionalities, but integration and
communication options should determine the choice for
software selection or development. A decision for a
software solution should, therefore, be made upon an API-
model.
Competitions API
So what are APIs? An API (Application Programming
Interface) is essentially a gateway that allows software to
talk to other software – and also defines how that
conversation takes place.
Thanks to the use of an API an organisation can decide for
itself which data to disclose. A competitions API would be
the solution and will allow a high level of integration for
existing sports software. The API opens all management,
registration, informational and results-entry options, any
sport organisers would need for its stakeholders, even if
implementing and benefitting from a full platform might be
a step too far.
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