Overview
What this challenge is about.
Audit a public REST API using an OpenAPI spec and SDK, score it on six axes, and document twelve fixes. Earn a verifiable certificate.
The scenario
The foundation builds open-source developer tools and maintains a public REST API that thousands of developers integrate against monthly; a botched version 3 freeze would lock poor ergonomics in for the whole major-version lifetime.
The Brief
What you'll do, and what you'll demonstrate.
Run a structured developer-experience audit on a version 3 candidate public API and produce twelve prioritized fixes the API committee can ship before the design freeze.
Earning criteria — what you'll demonstrate
- Evaluate a public API's developer experience against measurable axes using observable evidence rather than opinion
- Read an OpenAPI specification and an SDK module critically to surface onboarding, error, and parity problems
- Translate qualitative friction into scoped, estimated, and prioritized engineering work
- Design a reproducible audit rubric another engineer can apply and reach comparable results
- Communicate technical findings to a decision-making committee under a fixed deadline
Program Fit
Where this fits in your program.
Sharpens the same skills your degree expects you to demonstrate.
Aligned coursework coming soon.
Skills
Skills you'll demonstrate.
Each one shows up on your verified credential.
- Developer Experience
Apply developer experience to solve real industry problems and demonstrate production-level capability.
- Api Design
Design RESTful and GraphQL APIs that are intuitive, consistent, and well-documented.
- Documentation
Apply documentation to solve real industry problems and demonstrate production-level capability.
- Openapi
Apply openapi to solve real industry problems and demonstrate production-level capability.
- Research
Apply research to solve real industry problems and demonstrate production-level capability.
- Stakeholder Communication
Apply stakeholder communication to solve real industry problems and demonstrate production-level capability.
Careers
Career paths this challenge builds toward
Completing this challenge demonstrates skills that transfer directly to these roles:
Developer Experience Engineer
This challenge mirrors the core DX-engineering loop: audit a real API surface, quantify friction with evidence, and hand product and platform teams a prioritized, ship-ready improvement list before a release locks in.
This challenge sharpens
- developer-experience
- api-design
- stakeholder-communication
API Platform Engineer
Reviewing an OpenAPI specification for consistency, error quality, and specification-to-code parity is daily work for platform engineers who own public API contracts and guard them through major-version freezes.
This challenge sharpens
- api-design
- openapi
- documentation
Developer Advocate
Running first-hour tests, documenting onboarding friction, and translating it into changes that engineering teams will act on is the heart of advocacy work that keeps an API's developer community growing.
This challenge sharpens
- developer-experience
- documentation
- research