Robert Dionne
Chief Programmer
[email protected]
203.231.9961
On Feb 24, 2009, at 6:26 AM, Antony Blakey wrote:
On 24/02/2009, at 9:29 PM, Jan Lehnardt wrote:
CouchDB documents are limited to JSON (application/json) as the
content, that doesn't make the API less RESTful. If that's not the
right answer, I don't understand what you mean.
application/json doesn't define the semantics of the payload e.g.
how to interact with the resource. To do that it would have to be
application/json+couchdoc et al.
and it uses externally defined URL structures to effect operations.
Can you elaborate on that?
To be RESTful, the means of constructing URLs needs to be defined
by the media type specification. For example, having ?rev= is a
rule that is external to both the media type and the document.
A RESTful API would have a single entry point, with every other URL
and service constructed/discovered by processing the content,
applying the rules of the media type to the content to construct
new URLS, just like HTML. The HTML web doesn't have a manual
describing how to effect operations by constructing certain URLs
beyond the interpretation of the content.
Why then have folks like Sam Ruby* or Tim Bray not objected yet?
Not trying to pick a fight here, I'm just wondering if you are
interpreting
"the spec" a little too strict?
The term is defined by Roy Fielding's thesis, and he has objected
to the misuse of the term: http://roy.gbiv.com/untangled/2008/rest-
apis-must-be-hypertext-driven. And the next post: http://
roy.gbiv.com/untangled/2008/specialization is also good.
Antony,
I read this thesis ages ago, and technically you are correct, if
somewhat pedantic. I think CouchDB captures the just of being REST-
ful and certainly from a marketing perspective it's timely. When I
mention to potential customers that CouchDB database are accessed
with URIs they say "oh it uses this new REST stuff, cool". Often we
have little choice over how the world takes an idea and runs with it.
Regards,
Bob
My argument in this context is pointless. I know it's not going
to change.
How about not trying to subtly create "them-and-us" situation? It
seems
strange given that you clarified a statement about "the PMC"
earlier in
this thread to avoid misinterpretation (thanks). Also, you never
brought
this up, so how do you know it is not going to change?
I have brought this up before on [email protected]
- 15 November 2008, Subject: RESTful? (was: Re: Document Updates).
Apache archives don't cover that time on that list.
Hence, my comment, - let's not fire up this argument. I meant that
I wasn't going to waste m/l bandwidth rehashing an argument that
has already been done and dusted in this context.
Antony Blakey
--------------------------
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Ph: 0438 840 787
The project was so plagued by politics and ego that when the
engineers requested technical oversight, our manager hired a
psychologist instead.
-- Ron Avitzur
