DSS is a combination of technologies which includes many tools and APIs for distributed application development, administration and system management. The DSS API strategy guides the application developer by helping to determine which API should be used when multiple APIs could perform the desired function.

When the activity is porting, either from existing LAN Server applications to DSS applications or from existing application to family applications, one of the major objectives is to minimize the amount of rewrite. To that end, and to the extent that is possible, developers should use existing LAN Server APIs when porting applications. For the most part this will work for everything except the manipulation of ACLs on DSS servers.

When family application are ported or newly written, the strategy should be similar to that for porting applications in general. Family applications must determine if the target of an operation is a LAN Server, Warp Server, or DSS workstation before issuing API calls that only work in one environment or the other.