discover-api

Automatically discover API design skills when working with REST APIs, GraphQL schemas, API authentication, OAuth, JWT, rate limiting, API versioning, error handling, or endpoint design. Activates for backend API development tasks.

API Skills Discovery

Provides automatic access to comprehensive API design, authentication, and implementation skills.

When This Skill Activates

This skill auto-activates when you're working with:

• REST API design and implementation
• GraphQL schema design
• API authentication (JWT, OAuth 2.0, API keys, sessions)
• API authorization (RBAC, ABAC, permissions)
• Rate limiting and throttling
• API versioning strategies
• Error handling and validation
• HTTP methods, status codes, endpoints

Available Skills

Quick Reference

The API category contains 7 specialized skills:

1. rest-api-design - RESTful resource modeling, HTTP semantics, URL conventions
2. graphql-schema-design - GraphQL types, resolvers, N+1 problem prevention
3. api-authentication - JWT, OAuth 2.0, API keys, session management
4. api-authorization - RBAC, ABAC, policy engines, permission systems
5. api-rate-limiting - Token bucket, sliding window, rate limiting algorithms
6. api-versioning - API versioning, deprecation, backward compatibility
7. api-error-handling - RFC 7807 errors, validation, standardized responses

Load Full Category Details

For complete descriptions and workflows:

cat skills/api/INDEX.md

This loads the full API category index with:

• Detailed skill descriptions
• Usage triggers for each skill
• Common workflow combinations
• Cross-references to related skills

Load Specific Skills

Load individual skills as needed:

# Core API design
cat skills/api/rest-api-design.md
cat skills/api/graphql-schema-design.md

# Security and access control
cat skills/api/api-authentication.md
cat skills/api/api-authorization.md

# Production hardening
cat skills/api/api-rate-limiting.md
cat skills/api/api-error-handling.md
cat skills/api/api-versioning.md

Common Workflows

New REST API

Sequence: REST design → Authentication → Authorization

cat skills/api/rest-api-design.md      # Resource modeling, HTTP methods
cat skills/api/api-authentication.md   # User authentication
cat skills/api/api-authorization.md    # Access control

New GraphQL API

Sequence: GraphQL schema → Authentication → Authorization

cat skills/api/graphql-schema-design.md  # Schema design, resolvers
cat skills/api/api-authentication.md     # User authentication
cat skills/api/api-authorization.md      # Field-level permissions

API Hardening

Sequence: Rate limiting → Error handling → Versioning

cat skills/api/api-rate-limiting.md    # Prevent abuse
cat skills/api/api-error-handling.md   # Standardized errors
cat skills/api/api-versioning.md       # Manage evolution

Complete API Stack

Full implementation from scratch:

# 1. Design phase
cat skills/api/rest-api-design.md

# 2. Security phase
cat skills/api/api-authentication.md
cat skills/api/api-authorization.md
cat skills/api/api-rate-limiting.md

# 3. Production readiness
cat skills/api/api-error-handling.md
cat skills/api/api-versioning.md

Skill Selection Guide

Choose REST API skills when:

• Building traditional web services
• Need simple CRUD operations
• Working with mobile apps or SPAs
• Require caching and HTTP semantics

Choose GraphQL skills when:

• Clients need flexible data fetching
• Reducing over-fetching or under-fetching
• Building aggregation layers
• Need strong typing for APIs

Authentication vs Authorization:

• Authentication (api-authentication.md): Who are you? (Login, JWT, OAuth)
• Authorization (api-authorization.md): What can you do? (Permissions, RBAC)

Production considerations:

• Always implement rate limiting for public APIs
• Use versioning from day one
• Standardize error responses early

Integration with Other Skills

API skills commonly combine with:

Database skills (discover-database):

• API endpoints → Database queries
• Connection pooling for API servers
• Query optimization for API performance

Testing skills (discover-testing):

• Integration tests for API endpoints
• Contract testing for API consumers
• Load testing for API performance

Frontend skills (discover-frontend):

• API client libraries
• Data fetching patterns
• Error handling in UI

Infrastructure skills (discover-infra, discover-cloud):

• API deployment strategies
• Load balancing and scaling
• API gateways and proxies

Usage Instructions

1. Auto-activation: This skill loads automatically when Claude Code detects API-related work
2. Browse skills: Run cat skills/api/INDEX.md for full category overview
3. Load specific skills: Use bash commands above to load individual skills
4. Follow workflows: Use recommended sequences for common API patterns
5. Combine skills: Load multiple skills for comprehensive coverage

Progressive Loading

This gateway skill (~200 lines, ~2K tokens) enables progressive loading:

• Level 1: Gateway loads automatically (you're here now)
• Level 2: Load category INDEX.md (~3K tokens) for full overview
• Level 3: Load specific skills (~2-3K tokens each) as needed

Total context: 2K + 3K + skill(s) = 5-10K tokens vs 25K+ for entire index.

Quick Start Examples

"Design a REST API for a blog":

cat skills/api/rest-api-design.md

"Add OAuth authentication to my API":

cat skills/api/api-authentication.md

"Implement role-based access control":

cat skills/api/api-authorization.md

"Prevent API abuse":

cat skills/api/api-rate-limiting.md

"Design an API versioning strategy":

cat skills/api/api-versioning.md

---

Next Steps: Run cat skills/api/INDEX.md to see full category details, or load specific skills using the bash commands above.