Data silos are silent killers of productivity. How many times has your team debated whether to store a country list as "USA", "US", or "United States"? This seemingly trivial problem scales into a massive headache across applications, leading to inconsistent user experiences, faulty analytics, and brittle integrations. This is the chaos of mismanaged reference data.
Reference data is the foundational, slow-changing information that provides context to everything else. Think of country codes, currency lists, airport identifiers, or industry-specific categories. It's the "master data" that, when managed poorly, creates endless friction. The traditional approach—hardcoding lists or maintaining separate spreadsheets for every service—is a recipe for disaster.
The solution? A centralized, API-first approach that establishes a reliable Single Source of Truth (SSoT) for your entire organization.
When every application manages its own version of reference data, you're not just duplicating a list of ISO codes; you're accumulating technical debt and operational risk. This decentralized "strategy" leads to several critical problems:
Hardcoding a list of countries in your app seems fast at first, but it creates a rigid system that is expensive to maintain and impossible to scale reliably.
Imagine a world where your developers never have to worry about where to find the official list of ISO 4217 currencies again. Instead of managing files, they make a simple API call.
This is the power of a centralized reference data service. By treating reference data as a managed service—accessible via a unified API—you transform a source of chaos into a source of strength. The benefits are immediate:
This is precisely the problem reference.do was built to solve. We provide your single source of truth for reference data. Stop managing static datasets in every application and start accessing standard and custom data through one simple, reliable API.
Getting a complete, up-to-date list of world currencies is as simple as this:
import { Do } from '@do-inc/sdk';
const an = new Do(process.env.DO_API_KEY);
// Get a list of all ISO 4217 currencies
const currencies = await an.reference.get('iso-4217');
console.log(currencies);
/*
=> [
{ "code": "USD", "name": "United States Dollar", "symbol": "$" },
{ "code": "EUR", "name": "Euro", "symbol": "€" },
{ "code": "JPY", "name": "Japanese Yen", "symbol": "¥" },
...
]
*/
With reference.do, you get immediate access to a wide range of standard public datasets, including:
Crucially, reference.do also allows you to upload, manage, version, and query your own custom, proprietary datasets right alongside the public ones, all through the same simple API. Whether it's a list of your internal department codes, office locations, or product categories, you can manage it all in one place.
Stop letting scattered data dictate your workflow. By centralizing your reference data management, you eliminate inconsistencies, reduce maintenance overhead, and empower your developers to build faster and more reliable applications.
Visit reference.do today to learn how you can automate your reference data management and establish a single source of truth for your organization.
What is reference data?
Reference data is foundational, slow-changing data used to classify and categorize other data. Common examples include country codes, currency lists, airport codes, and measurement units. It's the 'master data' that provides context to your transactional data.
Why shouldn't I just hardcode a list of countries in my app?
Managing reference data across many applications and services is inefficient and leads to inconsistencies. A centralized service like reference.do ensures a single source of truth, reduces data duplication, simplifies updates, and makes integration seamless via a unified API.
What datasets are available through reference.do?
We provide a wide range of standard public datasets, including ISO codes for countries (3166), currencies (4217), and languages (639), as well as other common industry and geographic datasets. You can also upload and manage your own custom datasets.
Can I use my own custom reference data?
Yes. reference.do allows you to upload, manage, version, and query your own proprietary reference datasets right alongside our standard public ones, all through the same simple API.