[runroader]

I think the only thing here that I don't agree with is that internal users are just users. Yes, they may be more technical - or likely other programmers, but they're busy too. Often they're building their own thing and don't have the time or ability to deal with your API churning.

If at all possible, take your time and dog-food your API before opening it up to others. Once it's opened, you're stuck and need to respect the "never break userspace" contract.

[devmor]

I think versioning still helps solve this problem.

There’s a lot of things you can do with internal users to prevent causing a burden though - often the most helpful one is just collaborating on the spec and making the working copy available to stakeholders. Even if it’s a living document, letting them have a frame of reference can be very helpful (as long as your office politics prevent them from causing issues for you over parts in progress they do not like.)

[Supermancho]

With internal users, you likely have instrumentation that allows you to contact and have those users migrate. You can actually sunset api versions, making API versioning an attractive solution. I've both participated in API versioning and observed it employed in organizations that don't use it by default as a matter of utility.

[scott_w]

A big difference is you can tell internal users to update or else. It’s not free and should be reserved for good business reasons, but it can happen on a shorter time frame as you have the internal organisation to enforce it.

It’s not really an option in the same way with end users or customers, as they aren’t part of your organisation, by definition.