Modules/Building & Deploying APIs with AI/Advanced: Rate Limiting, Error Handling & API Documentation
Lesson 3 of 3•Building & Deploying APIs with AI0 of 3 complete (0%)
Advanced: Rate Limiting, Error Handling & API Documentation
12 min
What you will learn
- Implement rate limiting on API routes to prevent abuse
- Build a consistent error handling middleware pattern for all routes
- Generate OpenAPI/Swagger documentation with AI assistance
- Test APIs systematically with automated tests
# Advanced: Rate Limiting, Error Handling & API Documentation
Rate Limiting: Prevent Abuse
Without rate limiting, a single user (or bot) can overwhelm your API. Here is a simple in-memory rate limiter for serverless:
// lib/rate-limit.ts
const rateLimit = new Map<string, { count: number; resetTime: number }>();
export function checkRateLimit(
identifier: string,
limit: number = 10,
windowMs: number = 60_000
): { allowed: boolean; remaining: number } {
const now = Date.now();
const record = rateLimit.get(identifier);
if (!record || now > record.resetTime) {
rateLimit.set(identifier, { count: 1, resetTime: now + windowMs });
return { allowed: true, remaining: limit - 1 };
}
if (record.count >= limit) {
return { allowed: false, remaining: 0 };
}
record.count++;
return { allowed: true, remaining: limit - record.count };
}Unlock this lesson
Upgrade to Pro to access the full content
What you'll learn:
- Implement rate limiting on API routes to prevent abuse
- Build a consistent error handling middleware pattern for all routes
- Generate OpenAPI/Swagger documentation with AI assistance