Stage 1 of 8 · 8 lessons · ~4 weeks

How automation works

The ideas every automation tool is built on: triggers and actions, data mapping, JSON, HTTP and REST APIs, webhooks, authentication and rate limits. Learn them once and every tool, and every API document, starts to make sense.

Start: Triggers, actions and what to automate

Lessons· one lesson for each topic, in this order

Do this

Write down three tasks from your own life or a family business and mark which are frequent and rule-based.
Read five JSON responses from a public API and write the path to one nested field in each.
Call a public API from Postman: one GET and one POST, and note the status codes.
Create a Webhook.site URL, point a free form tool at it and read the request that arrives.
Read the authentication and rate limit pages of one API you would like to use.
Explain OAuth scopes to a friend in two minutes without notes.

Start with· follow one of these

GuideFree
MDN: HTTP
Mozilla · Beginner
Read the overview, methods, status codes and headers pages: the HTTP every automation tool sits on
GuideFree
JavaScript.info
Ilya Kantor
The JSON methods and objects chapters teach you to read and reshape the data each step passes on

Practise

Postman
Call real APIs by hand, see status codes and headers, before you build anything around them
Webhook.site
Get a throwaway URL and see exactly what an app sends in a webhook

Keep handy

roadmap.sh: API Design
A map of API concepts, from REST and auth to rate limiting, to check what you have not met yet
OAuth 2.0 Simplified
Clear chapters on OAuth flows and scopes for when "Connect your account" stops being magic

Also worth your time

API Design Best Practices: 10 Rules for Clean, Scalable APIs (opens in a new tab)Read
Status codes, pagination, idempotency and rate limits from the API side, so you know what to expect as a caller

Before moving on: A short written walkthrough of one public API you called from Postman (auth, one GET, one POST, the status codes you saw, its rate limit) and a Webhook.site capture of a real event from an app such as a form tool.

Tauseef's advice

Do not skip this for the drag-and-drop tutorials. Every tool hides HTTP and JSON behind friendly boxes, and the day a client needs an app without a connector, or a workflow fails with a 401, these basics are what you fall back on. A week or two here saves months of guessing.