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REST Introduction

24 points by pulsarpietro ↗ HN
Does anybody know a short introduction to REST APIs ? I know HTTP reasonably well (it is not that complicated after all, I dare to say) and I need to know specifically what REST is about. I understand that being ignorant on the matter does not help in selecting a good source, but I've found all books (PDFs) on the internet excessively long, 300 pages+. Is it me overlooking the topic - because I don't know what I am talking about - or are they truly excessive ?

Any recommendations ?

12 comments

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kody
I strongly recommend Designing Web APIs: http://shop.oreilly.com/product/0636920123880.do

You can jump ahead to the Representational State Transfer chapter to get a good overview of REST, then read whichever chapters seem interesting or solve whichever problems you're facing.

macca321
There's two kinds of REST. REST as most developers misunderstand it, and REST as Roy Fielding, inventor of REST, understands it.

For the former you can read the Microsoft REST guidelines, for the latter I suggest getting Mike Amundsen's RESTful Web APIs book.

If you do go with the latter be prepared for a lot of frustration with those who went with the former.