Optimize API call in Symfony

Question

How optimize an API call in symfony?

I call with Guzzle bundle, but the time in some situations is very long.

In client application call a function from the server. In server application extract the objects from the database and send back to the client. In client creat the new object with properties from server respons.

Answer 1

One of the ways to improve your API calls is to use caching. In Symfony there are many different ways to achieve this. I can show you one of them (PhpFileCache example):

In services.yml create cache service:

your_app.cache_provider:
    class: Doctrine\Common\Cache\PhpFileCache
    arguments: ["%kernel.cache_dir%/path_to/your_cache_dir", ".your.cached_file_name.php"]

(Remember, you need Doctrine extension in your app to work)

Then pass your caching service your_app.cache_provider to any service where you need caching:

Again in your services.yml:

some_service_of_yours:
    class: AppBundle\Services\YourService
    arguments: ['@your_app.cache_provider']

Finally, in your service (where you want to perform API caching):

use Doctrine\Common\Cache\CacheProvider;

class YourService
{
    private $cache;

    public function __construct(CacheProvider $cache)
    {
        $this->cache = $cache;
    }

    public function makeApiRequest()
    {
        $key = 'some_unique_identifier_of_your_cache_record';

        if(!$data = $this->cache->fetch($key))
        {
            $data = $provider->makeActualApiCallHere('http://some_url');
            $this->cache->save($key, serialize($data), 10800); //10800 here is amount of seconds to store your data in cache before its invalidated, change it to your needs
        }

        return $data; // now you can use the data
    } 
}

This is quite GENERIC example, you should change it to your exact needs, but idea is simple. You can cache data and avoid unnecessary API calls to speed things up. Be careful though, because cache has drawback of presenting stale(obsolete) data. Some things can (and should) be cached, but some things don't.