API Gateway: the ultimate middleman for all your proxying needs
API Gateway: the ultimate middleman for all your proxying needs was initially published on Friday January 06 2023 on the Tech Dev Blog. For the latest up-to-date content, fresh out of the oven, visit https://techdevblog.io and subscribe to our newsletter!
AWS API Gateway is a fully managed service that makes it easy for developers to create, publish, maintain, monitor, and secure APIs at any scale. One way you can use API Gateway is as a proxy, by using the HTTP integration type.
But why would you want to use API Gateway as a proxy? Here are a few reasons:
- You want to expose an existing HTTP/HTTPS service without having to worry about the underlying infrastructure.
- You want to add API Gateway-specific functionality, such as API keys, rate limiting, and caching, to an existing service.
- You want to perform tasks such as header mapping, query string manipulation, and body mapping between the client and the backend service.
When should you use API Gateway as a proxy? Some use cases include:
- Exposing an on-premises service to the internet.
- Exposing a service hosted in another VPC.
- Exposing a service hosted on EC2 or on-premises.
Now, let's talk about how to use API Gateway as a proxy with HTTP integration using the AWS console. Here are the steps:
- Navigate to the API Gateway console and create a new API.
- Create a new resource and method for the API. For the method, choose
ANY
as the HTTP method and selectHTTP
as the integration type. - In the
HTTP Integration
section, enter the URL of the backend service in theEndpoint URL
field. - If the backend service requires any specific headers or query strings, you can specify them in the
HTTP Headers
andQuery String Parameters
fields. - In the
Body Mapping Templates
section, you can specify how the request and response bodies should be transformed between the client and the backend service. This is optional, but can be useful for tasks such as converting between different data formats (e.g., JSON to XML). - Save and deploy your API.
That's it! You can now send requests to your API Gateway endpoint and they will be proxied to the backend service.
I hope this short introductory tutorial was helpful and gave you a better understanding of when and how to use AWS API Gateway as a proxy with HTTP integration. Happy proxying!
API Gateway: the ultimate middleman for all your proxying needs was initially published on Friday January 06 2023 on the Tech Dev Blog. For the latest up-to-date content, fresh out of the oven, visit https://techdevblog.io and subscribe to our newsletter!