# What the API is for An API lets one piece of software talk to another. Silktide's screens are for people; its API is the same information and the same actions, for software. On its own the API does nothing: a developer writes code that asks it questions or tells it what to do. That is useful in two ways. Work that people do by hand in Silktide every week can run by itself. And Silktide can be joined to the systems you already have, even ones nobody else uses, without waiting for Silktide to support them. ## Three things people build ### Scores in your own dashboard Your developer asks the API for [your websites' scores](https://developers.silktide.com/v1/governance/scores/get-scores.md), or [how a score has moved over time](https://developers.silktide.com/v1/governance/scores/get-score-trend.md), and sends them to the dashboard your organization already uses, every day or every hour. People see Silktide's numbers beside the rest of your reporting without signing in to Silktide. ### Thousands of websites, kept in step If your list of websites lives somewhere else, such as a content system or a spreadsheet of departments, your developer can keep Silktide in step with it. New websites are [created](https://developers.silktide.com/v1/governance/websites/create-website.md), changed ones [updated](https://developers.silktide.com/v1/governance/websites/update-website.md), and retired ones [deleted](https://developers.silktide.com/v1/governance/websites/delete-website.md), with nobody copying them across by hand. ### A Monday morning update in your team chat Your developer asks the API [how your Analytics goals are doing](https://developers.silktide.com/v1/analytics/engagement/get-goals.md) and posts a summary to your team's chat every Monday: how many people signed up, booked or bought last week, and whether that is up or down. ## Reading these docs without writing code Most of what the API can do is clear from the page titles alone. Skim the reference for your app in the menu, such as Governance's websites: each page starts with a sentence saying what it does. The detail below that is for developers, and you can leave it to them. When you are ready to hand it over, send your developer the [Quickstart](https://developers.silktide.com/guides/quickstart.md). An account administrator creates the API key it needs, in Silktide under **Settings**, then **API**.