REST API Design Guideline: Resource Modeling

“The key abstraction of information in REST is a resource. Any information that can be named can be a resource: a document or image, a temporal service (e.g. “today’s weather in Los Angeles”), a collection of other resources, a non-virtual object (e.g. a person), and so on.“

Dr. Roy Fielding

Content

• Concept
• Basics
• Starting Point
• Resources Granularity
• Fine vs Coarse Grained Resource Modeling
• Keep Business Logic behind an API
• Modeling Business Process as a Resource
• Resource Naming Conventions
• Wrapping Up
• What’s Next

Concept

Resources are the core component in any REST API modeling. The other building blocks, namely HTTP verbs, status codes, custom headers and payloads formatting are built on top of it. Modeling API resources in a right granularity level is a key aspect. It is crucial to maintain balance between fine grained chatty versus very…