I wrote the page every developer reads first.

#api #documentation #webdev #productivity

In my last post, I introduced Troyal, a fictional API for tracking music and film royalties, and shared the product brief, the API design and the README.

And now, I just wrote the Getting Started guide.

If you're a developer trying a new API, this is the page you open first. Its primary job is to get you from nothing to a working request as fast as possible.

My guide takes you through:

Getting an API key
Sending your first request to GET /works
Reading the response
Fixing the most common errors (401, 404 and 429)

The part I paid most attention to was the troubleshooting table. Errors are when a developer needs the docs most, and a clear "here's what went wrong and what to do" prevents frustration.

Everything is public on GitHub, and Part 3 will be the OpenAPI spec.

Troyal is fictional. The documentation is real.

https://github.com/joycefoster642/Troyal-API-Docs