What does REST stand for?
REST stands for “Representational State Transfer”, which is an architectural style used for designing web APIs that are scalable, flexible, and easy to maintain.
REST APIs are designed around a ____.
REST APIs are designed around a set of standard HTTP methods (such as GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE) and the representation of resources through URIs (Uniform Resource Identifiers).
What is an identifier of a resource? Give an example.
An identifier of a resource is a unique string of characters used to identify a specific resource in a web API, such as a URL or URI, with an example being “https://example.com/api/posts/123” as the identifier for a specific blog post in a REST API.
What are the most common HTTP verbs?
The most common HTTP verbs are GET, POST, PUT, PATCH, DELETE, OPTIONS, and HEAD.
What should the URIs be based on?
URIs should be based on the resources that they represent, rather than the actions that can be performed on them, to follow the principles of RESTful API design.
Give an example of a good URI.
A good example of a URI for a RESTful API would be “https://example.com/api/posts/123” which uniquely identifies a specific blog post resource.
What does it mean to have a ‘chatty’ web API? Is this a good or a bad thing?
A ‘chatty’ web API is one that requires a large number of small and frequent requests to perform a single operation, which is generally considered a bad thing as it can result in increased network traffic, latency, and resource usage.
What status code does a successful GET request return?
A successful GET request returns a status code of 200 OK, along with the requested resource in the response body.
What status code does an unsuccessful GET request return?
A failed GET request returns a specific error status code, such as 404 Not Found or 401 Unauthorized.
What status code does a successful POST request return?
POST success: 201 Created with new resource representation.
What status code does a successful DELETE request return?
Successful DELETE request returns 204 No Content.