In this unit, I added 2 APIs to the “Contact Us” page to enhance the user experience. The first one was a map showing where we are geographically located. I used the Google Maps API to achieve this. This was a key feature because it will give all the personas a sense of where we are located in the world. This will help them understand what it will look like to go into business with us if they live in a different time zone. The second feature was a SendGrid API to handle the sending of emails when the user submits the contact form. This was also a key feature as it will give the users a sense of security that their request was received, and we are reviewing it. Overall, this unit went pretty well, and I really enjoyed researching and working with APIs. APIs are the key to the success of any website. If you don’t need to reinvent the wheel, don’t do it. There are many talented people who have created services and pieces of code that we can leverage in our work. If I were to do this unit again, I would like to add another API, either something related to sharing the webpage or some other form of user interaction. Being a website for a software vendor company, exposure is important, and I would have liked to add an API that can increase our exposure given more time.

NOTE: THE SEND EMAIL BUTTON WILL NOT WORK AS I HAVE REMOVED THE API KEY BEFORE CREATING THE ZIP AS IT IS A PAID SERVICE.

Here you can find the zip folder of the code base: https://landing.athabascau.ca/file/view/14821408/unit-7-api-code-submission