This talk introduces “cognitive” APIs, such as those for image recognition, text analysis, recommendations, and predictions. I will explain what cognitive APIs are and how to use them and do a live comparison of four image-recognition endpoints. I will show the similarities in usage patterns and highlight the differences in API design, implementation, and capabilities, including pre-trained APIs and trainable-models-as-a-service. The second half of this talk is a live demo of an e-commerce chatbot that uses a combination of natural-language understanding and API orchestration to deliver commerce features over a conversational interface. I will then explain how the bot is built and where the “smarts” come from. I will discuss the ever-increasing importance of cognitive APIs and how no-screen interfaces like chatbots will stimulate the API economy.
