Gating APIs with Lightning: A Hands-On L402 Workshop Using Aperture
L402 is an open standard that turns Lightning into an authentication and payment layer for APIs. Instead of API keys and subscription plans, your service issues a Lightning invoice — the client pays, gets a macaroon, and gains access. It's permissionless, programmable, and built on open-source tooling. In this hands-on workshop, we'll build an L402-gated API from scratch using Aperture, the open-source reverse proxy from the LND ecosystem. Participants will work in a pre-configured regtest environment (Docker-based, no mainnet sats needed) and walk through the full cycle: setting up a backend service, placing it behind Aperture, configuring macaroon-based access, and testing the 402 Payment Required flow from the client side.
