difference between API products: RFA / ETA /EMA/ UPA

jessie.lin

Hi Sir

My client purchased ERT solution +RDC service. When developing their applications, they find there are many API products available as RFA, ETA, EMA, UPA. They want to clarify the difference between those products, e.g. performance, usability and stability .

Please help indicate where client could find those details information. Thank you!

umer.nalla

Hi @jessie.lin

They can find information on all the APIs on this website from the home page
Thomson Reuters Developer Community

As for differences, in summary:

RFA is our legacy feature complete API

UPA has now been re-branded as Elektron Transport API (ETA)

ETA is our lowest level highest performance strategic API

Elektron Message API is a higher level strategic API which is easier to use whilst still offering a high level of performance.

For most developers EMA is the recommend API for any new development or rewrite of existing applications. The performance should be more than adequate for the majority of use case scenarios.It is much easier to learn, less code is required to implement functionality and therefore also easier to maintain long term.

For those requiring the highest level of performance e.g. algorithmic trading - they should consider ETA.

For a high level overview of EMA please refer them to my article Introduction to Elektron Message API as well as the Elektron SDK page (which includes EMA and ETA).