- From: Jan Algermissen <jalgermissen@topicmapping.com>
- Date: Mon, 27 Mar 2006 23:20:07 +0200
- To: Danny Ayers <danny.ayers@gmail.com>
- Cc: "Mark Nottingham" <mnot@yahoo-inc.com>, public-web-http-desc@w3.org
Hi, while I do not have a good term, I suggest looking at this in terms of the question: what role do resources play with regard to a RESTful application. Hmm, just thinking this: why not indeed use "interface" or API and at the same time pointing out that the API-as-set-methods idea is useless in REST anyhow. You might also look at the issue that way: what does a client programer program against (what does she have to know) in the REST world? The answer is: the semantics of the hypermedia used by the application (in order to execute the application). Actually, the question of what resources there are in an application should not be part of the shared knowledge between client and server since that resource set can change at runtime. Bottom line: do not describe a REST application in terms of the resources exposed (except for a small set of enry points of course). Just thoughts, hope they help. Jan On Mar 27, 2006, at 9:45 PM, Danny Ayers wrote: > > On 3/27/06, Mark Nottingham <mnot@yahoo-inc.com> wrote: >> >> I'm seeing some confusion when people say "interface" in relation to >> the Web; a RESTifarian will say that the interface is uniform -- >> e.g., GET, PUT, DELETE, POST -- but there's also a colloquial use of >> "interface" to indicate the set of resources that a Web application >> exposes; e.g., "the Flickr REST interface." >> >> Anybody have a better term for the latter (that isn't too unnatural)? > > Still seems an improvement on calling everything an API, though having > said that... > > "Interface" seems not-inaccurate for both cases, so (in lieu of a more > distinctive alternative) how about using qualifiers, maybe "common" or > "base" interface for the HTTP methods, "domain" or even "application" > interface for Flickr etc..? > > Cheers, > Danny. > > > > -- > > http://dannyayers.com >
Received on Monday, 27 March 2006 21:20:44 UTC