Company
Date Published
Author
Maylee Jacob
Word count
1134
Language
English
Hacker News points
None

Summary

Indeed's innovative approach to API management involved running two competing GraphQL platforms, EmployerGraph and Jobseeker Federator, to determine the most effective strategy for their needs, ultimately leading to the unified OneGraph platform. This strategic decision arose from a need to address the chaos of inconsistent APIs that impeded development and integration efforts, resulting in slowed engineering velocity and business growth challenges. By experimenting with two parallel platforms, Indeed gained valuable insights into the benefits of decentralized ownership and scalability, eventually choosing Jobseeker Federator for its superior performance and flexibility, migrating all APIs to Apollo Federation. The successful migration enabled Indeed to handle 100 billion requests per month, integrate third-party services like Glassdoor, and launch new initiatives such as Indeed PLUS in Japan. Despite the success, the rapid scaling introduced new challenges, prompting refinements in governance, domain model alignment, and graph organization to better serve specific user needs and maintain quality. Indeed's journey underscores the importance of experimentation and data-driven decision-making in API strategy, demonstrating that exploring multiple approaches can lead to a robust and scalable solution.