Working offline in API Designer

Work with API definitions offline using the API Designer application, then import them to API Connect V12 Reserved for staging and publishing.

About this task

You can download API Designer and work with APIs offline, updating the local Product and API artifacts. For staging and publishing of that local content, you must choose one of the following options:

  • Log in to the V12 Reserved instance UI and import the local artifacts.
  • Use the API Connect Toolkit to log in to the V12 Reserved instance and then deploy those local artifacts using the CLI.

Procedure

  1. Download and extract IBM API Studio as described in Setting up the toolkit for V12 Reserved.
  2. Start the IBM API Studio by running the application from the location where you extracted the contents of the toolkit compressed file.
    Note: If you see a message stating that credentials cannot be found, download new credentials as explained in Setting up the toolkit for V12 Reserved.
  3. If you receive the Accept License page, click the URL to read the license agreement, then click the button to accept the license.
  4. If you receive the IBM ID login page, enter your IBM customer ID.
  5. Open a directory on your local file system to store the API and Product specifications that you will create in IBM API Studio.
  6. On the API Designer Home page, select Develop APIs and Products to start working in offline mode.
    Note: API Connect requires your API definition to include certain sections that are not provided in an OpenAPI definition by default. If you want to use an OpenAPI definition file from elsewhere instead of creating it in API Designer, you must import the API definition into API Designer before you can work with it. For more information, see Adding a REST API by importing an OpenAPI definition file and IBM extensions to the OpenAPI specification.
  7. When you are ready to stage and publish your APIs, log in to V12 Reserved and import your API definitions so you can work with them in API Manager.