API versioning strategies in HLD - Practice Problems & Coding Challenges

Challenge - 5 Problems

🧠 Conceptual

intermediate

Understanding URI Versioning

Which of the following best describes the main advantage of using URI versioning for APIs?

A It hides the API version from clients, reducing URL complexity.

B It allows clients to specify the API version in the URL, making it easy to cache and route requests.

C It automatically upgrades clients to the latest API version without changes.

D It uses HTTP headers to specify the version, keeping URLs clean.

💡 Hint

Think about how URLs are used in web requests and caching.

URI versioning places the version number in the URL path, which makes it explicit and easy for caching systems and routers to handle different versions separately.

❓ Architecture

intermediate

Choosing Header Versioning

What is a key benefit of using HTTP header versioning for APIs compared to URI versioning?

A It prevents caching of API responses.

B It forces clients to change URLs when switching versions.

C It keeps the URL clean and separates versioning concerns from resource identification.

D It makes it easier for browsers to bookmark specific API versions.

💡 Hint

Consider how URLs look and how headers work in HTTP.

Header versioning keeps the URL unchanged and uses HTTP headers to specify the version, which separates versioning from resource paths and keeps URLs clean.

❓ scaling

advanced

Scaling API with Multiple Versions

When supporting multiple API versions simultaneously, which strategy helps minimize server resource usage while maintaining backward compatibility?

A Implement a shared core logic with version-specific adapters to handle differences.

B Duplicate the entire codebase for each API version.

C Only support the latest version and reject older clients.

D Use URI versioning exclusively without shared components.

💡 Hint

Think about code reuse and maintenance effort.

Sharing core logic and using adapters for version differences reduces duplication and resource use while supporting multiple versions.

❓ tradeoff

advanced

Tradeoffs of Semantic Versioning in APIs

What is a major tradeoff when adopting semantic versioning (major.minor.patch) for API versioning?

A It forces clients to always use the latest patch version automatically.

B It simplifies client logic by hiding version details.

C It eliminates the need for backward compatibility.

D It provides detailed version info but can complicate client version negotiation.

💡 Hint

Consider how clients decide which version to use.

Semantic versioning gives detailed version info but requires clients to understand and negotiate versions carefully, adding complexity.

❓ estimation

expert

Estimating Storage for API Versioning Metadata

An API service stores metadata for each version of its endpoints. If each version adds 500KB of metadata and the service supports 12 versions with 100 endpoints each, approximately how much storage is needed for all metadata?

A 600 MB

B 600 KB

C 60 MB

D 6 GB

💡 Hint

Calculate total metadata size by multiplying versions, endpoints, and size per endpoint.

12 versions × 100 endpoints = 1200 endpoints total. 1200 × 500KB = 600,000 KB = 600 MB.