IntegrationAdvancedversioningschemaapi-contract
Design integration payload JSON schema versioning with backward compatibility
Real World Scenario
Partner API v2 adds required field; v1 partners break until coordinated upgrade causing production outage.
Expected Answer
• Semantic versioning major breaking minor additive
• New fields optional with defaults in v1 compatible releases
• schemaVersion property in every payload
• Consumer rejects unknown major version explicit error
• Contract testing Pact between producer consumer CI
• Deprecation timeline 12 months dual support v1 v2
• Transformation layer maps v1 to canonical v2 internally
Follow-Up Questions & Answers
Click to expand — each follow-up includes a direct, interview-ready answer
Direct answer: Semantic versioning major breaking minor additive Also consider: New fields optional with defaults in v1 compatible releases In practice: schemaVersion property in every payload Optimize for scale and operational observability.
Architect Perspective
Breaking schema changes without version strategy guarantee partner outage—additive-only default.