I am in a process of designing APIs to allow customers to manage their data using POST/PUT/GET.
One of the challenges for the API is that there are number of fields in entities that should have values from predetermined sets.
One of the approaches I see is to allow clients to pass IDs for each of the data filed(properties) and have a supplementary method to provide clients with available options for the data fields.
So the client interaction with the service will be:
Client: GET \Options (returns set of available options for each field)
Client: POST \Data (sends the DTO with set of IDs for each property this saves the data to the server)
Another option as I see is to let client to send actual values instead of IDs.
What approach do you recommend? And why?
Let clients pass the data as values BUT store the data as a foreign key on your server.
Let's say you design an API for adding cars and the car colour should be a value from a predetermined set.
HTTP requests:
GET cars/1
=> 200 OK
{ id: 1, name: "Ferrari", colour: "Red }
POST cars
{ name: Lamborghini, colour: "Blue" }
=> 201 Created (cars/2)
Database (just an example):
Table [Car]: #ID (Integer) , Name (Varchar) , ColourID (Integer)
Table [Colour] : #ID (Integer), Name(Varchar)
...where the Car.ColourID is a foreign key to your Colour.ID
The advantages are:
The API is easy to use
You still maintain the data constraint from predetermined sets, for example POSTing a car with colour: "Dog" should result in HTTP response with error information (e.g. Invalid colour).
Related
Im bulding a game server where i'm holding a list of connected users and at the same time a list of battles, those 2 lists are seperate.
I'm holding the battles data in Redis db, with battle id as the key,
could I use the connected user list in the same Redis db and get a list of the connected users in a elegant way while avoining battles data ?
I couldn't find a solution for that and currently holding the connected users in JS dictionary in my nodeJs server
UPDATE:
to clarify queries,
connected user object is -
connectedUser = {
nickname: string, (key)
socketId: string,
status: string,
rating: number
}
i would like to query the data with getUser(nickname) which will fetch a specific user and getAllUsers() to fetch all connected users.
as for match it includes all match data and stats
match = {
id: string, (key)
nicknameOne: string,
nicknameTwo: string,
...
}
on matches I query with id and believed it works well with hash table and hset and hget complexity wize.
as for queries on connected user, I wonder if using a simple js dictionary might provide with faster query results.
the js dictionary looks like that -
connectedUsers = {}
adding user -
user = {
key: nickname,
value: {
socketId: string,
status: string,
rating: number
}
}
while getting a specific user like that -
connectedUsers[nickname]
and iterating all this way -
for(let key in connectedUsers) {
//value - connectedUsers[key];
}
Nothing will beat the JS dictionary in terms of performance. Even with something as fast as Redis you're adding the overhead of interprocess communication (if hosted on the same machine) or network latencies.
If you want to use Redis for persistence, one way to store connected users would be to have a hash where keys are nicknames and values are user objects. You can do HGET users-key userId to get 1 user and HGETALL users-key to fetch all users.
I'm building a Zapier app for a platform that have dynamic fields. I have an API that returns the list of fields for one of my resource (for example) :
[
{ name: "First Name", key: "first_name", type: "String" },
{ name: "Civility", key: "civility", type: "Multiple" }
]
I build my action's inputFields based on this API :
create: {
[...],
operation: {
inputFields: [
fetchFields()
],
[...]
},
}
The API returns type that are list of values (i.e : Civility), but to get these values I have to make another API call.
For now, what I have done is in my fetchFields function, each time I encounter a type: "Multiple", I do another API call to get the possible values and set it as choices in my input field. However this is expensive and the page on Zapier takes too much time to display the fields.
I tried to use the z.dehydrate feature provided by Zapier but it doesn't work for input choices.
I can't use a dynamic dropdown here as I can't pass the key of the field possible value I'm looking for. For example, to get back the possible values for Civility, I'll need to pass the civility key to my API.
What are the options in this case?
David here, from the Zapier Platform team.
Thanks for writing in! I think what you're doing is possible, but I'm also not 100% that I understand what you're asking.
You can have multiple API calls in the function (which it sounds like you are). In the end, the function should return an array of Field objects (as descried here).
The key thing you might not be aware of is that subsequent steps have access to a partially-filled bundle.inputData, so you can have a first function that gets field options and allows a user to select something, then a second function that runs and pulls in fields based on that choice.
Otherwise, I think a function that does 2 api calls (one to fetch the field types and one to turn them into Zapier field objects) is the best bet.
If this didn't answer your question, feel free to email partners#zapier.com or join the slack org (linked at the bottom of the readme) and we'll try to solve it there.
I recently started experimenting with the REST API for SharePoint 2013 Foundation and I am trying to return all entries in a list. My GET request returns the data I am looking for, but the IDs used to identify the columns in the list are not helpful for identifying what the information is (see images below). The column IDs between 'Title' and 'ID', in the second image, are a jumble of characters.
SharePoint List View
Response Data
Is there any way to configure the list to use the column names as IDs? Also, is there some significance to the characters currently used as IDs?
You will need to make a second request to get a listing of columns that includes the InternalName and the Title which is what you are trying to reference:
You can use this REST call:
_api/web/lists/GetByTitle('Project Details')/fields
or you can use CSOM:
using (ClientContext context = new ClientContext(url))
{
List list = context.Web.Lists.GetByTitle("Project Details");
context.Load(list, l => l.Fields);
context.ExecuteQuery();
foreach(Field field in list.Fields)
{
Console.WriteLine(field.Title);
Console.WriteLine(field.InternalName);
}
}
SharePoint automatically generates the InternalName and it is a read-only field, at least using REST. It'll be easier to get the Field Data to correlate the InternalName to the Title than changing the values.
The column you are referring to, between Title and Id, is the ID of the content type associated to the item. It is not a column ID.
The SharePoint REST API is OData compliant, so you can use the $select parameter to query for the neccesary fields.
http://server/site/_api/web/lists('guid')/items?$select=Column1,Column2
Please be aware though, lookup fields need to be expanded as well, otherwise you get only the Id of the lookup item.
http://server/site/_api/web/lists('guid')/items?$select=LookupColumn&$expand=LookupColumn/Title
This question is language independent. Let's not worry about frameworks or implementation, let's just say everything can be implemented and let's look at REST API in an abstract way. In other words: I'm building a framework right now and I didn't see any solution to this problem anywhere.
Question
How one can construct REST URL endpoint for intersection of two independent REST paths which return collections? Short example: How to intersect /users/1/comments and /companies/6/comments?
Constraint
All endpoints should return single data model entity or collection of entities.
Imho this is a very reasonable constraint and all examples of Hypermedia APIs look like this, even in draft-kelly-json-hal-07.
If you think this is an invalid constraint or you know a better way please let me know.
Example
So let's say we have an application which has three data types: products, categories and companies. Each company can add some products to their profile page. While adding the product they must attach a category to the product. For example we can access this kind of data like this:
GET /categories will return collection of all categories
GET /categories/9 will return category of id 9
GET /categories/9/products will return all products inside category of id 9
GET /companies/7/products will return all products added to profile page of company of id 7
I've omitted _links hypermedia part on purpose because it is straightforward, for example / gives _links to /categories and /companies etc. We just need to remember that by using hypermedia we are traversing relations graph.
How to write URL that will return: all products that are from company(7) and are of category(9)? In otherwords how to intersect /categories/9/products and /companies/7/products?
Assuming that all endpoints should represent data model resource or collection of them I believe this is a fundamental problem of REST Hypermedia API, because in traversing hypermedia api we are traversing relational graph going down one path so it is impossible to describe such intersection because it is a cross-section of two independent graph paths.
In other words I think we cannot represent two independent paths with only one path. Normally we traverse one path like A->B->C, but if we have X->Y and Z->Y and we want all Ys that come from X and Z then we have a problem.
So far my proposition is to use query strings: /categories/9/products?intersect=/companies/9 but can we do better?
Why do I want this?
Because I'm building a framework which will auto-generate REST Hypermedia API based on SQL database relations. You could think of it as a trans compiler of URLs to SELECT ... JOIN ... WHERE queries, but the client of the API only sees Hypermedia and the client would like to have a nice way of doing intersections, like in the example.
I don't think you should always look at REST as database representation, this case looks more of a kind of specific functionality to me. I think I'd go with something like this:
/intersection/comments?company=9&product=5
I've been digging after I wrote it and this is what I've found (http://www.vinaysahni.com/best-practices-for-a-pragmatic-restful-api):
Sometimes you really have no way to map the action to a sensible RESTful structure. For example, a multi-resource search doesn't really make sense to be applied to a specific resource's endpoint. In this case, /search would make the most sense even though it isn't a resource. This is OK - just do what's right from the perspective of the API consumer and make sure it's documented clearly to avoid confusion.
What You want to do is to filter products in one of the categories ... so following Your example if we have:
GET /categories/9/products
Above will return all products in category 9, so to filter out products for company 7 I would use something like this
GET /categories/9/products?company=7
You should treat URI as link to fetch all data (just like simple select query in SQL) and query parameters as where, limit, desc etc.
Using this approach You can build complex and readable queries fe.
GET /categories/9/products?company=7&order=name,asc&offset=10&limit=20
All endpoints should return single data model entity or collection of
entities.
This is NOT a REST constraint. If you want to read about REST constraints, then read the Fielding dissertation.
Because I'm building a framework which will auto-generate REST
Hypermedia API based on SQL database relations.
This is a wrong approach and has nothing to do with REST.
By REST you describe possible resource state transitions (or operation call templates) by sending hyperlinks in the response. These hyperlinks consist of a HTTP methods and URIs (and other data which is not relevant now) if you build the uniform interface using the HTTP and URI standards, and we usually do so. The URIs are not (necessarily) database entity and collection identifiers and if you apply such a constraint you will end up with a CRUD API, not with a REST API.
If you cannot describe an operation with the combination of HTTP methods and already existing resources, then you need a new resource.
In your case you want to aggregate the GET /users/1/comments and GET /companies/6/comments responses, so you need to define a link with GET and a third resource:
GET /comments/?users=1&companies=6
GET /intersection/users:1/companies:6/comments
GET /intersection/users/1/companies/6/comments
etc...
RESTful architecture is about returning resources that contain hypermedia controls that offer state transitions. What i see here is a multistep process of state transitions. Let's assume you have a root resource and somehow navigate over to /categories/9/products using the available hypermedia controls. I'd bet the results would look something like this in hal:
{
_links : {
self : { href : "/categories/9/products"}
},
_embedded : {
item : [
{json of prod 1},
{json of prod 2}
]
}
}
If you want your client to be able to intersect this with another collection you need to provide to them the mechanism to perform this. You have to give them a hypermedia control. HAL only has links, templated links, and embedded as control types. let's go with links..change the response to:
{
_links : {
self : { href : "/categories/9/products"},
x:intersect-with : [
{
href : "URL IS ABSOLUTELY IRRELEVANT!!! but unique 1",
title : "Company 6 products"
},
{
href : "URL IS ABSOLUTELY IRRELEVANT!!! but unique 2",
title : "Company 5 products"
},
{
href : "URL IS ABSOLUTELY IRRELEVANT!!! but unique 3",
title : "Company 7 products"
}
]
},
_embedded : {
item : [
{json of prod 1},
{json of prod 2}
]
}
}
Now the client just picks the right hypermedia control (aka link) based on the title field of the link.
That's the simplest solution. But you'll probably say there's 1000's of companies i don't want 1000's of links...well ok if that;s REALLY the case...you just offer a state transition in the middle of the two we have:
{
_links : {
self : { href : "/categories/9/products"},
x:intersect-options : { href : "URL to a Paged collection of all intersect options"},
x:intersect-with : [
{
href : "URL IS ABSOLUTELY IRRELEVANT!!! but unique 1",
title : "Company 6 products"
},
{
href : "URL IS ABSOLUTELY IRRELEVANT!!! but unique 2",
title : "Company 5 products"
},
{
href : "URL IS ABSOLUTELY IRRELEVANT!!! but unique 3",
title : "Company 7 products"
}
]
},
_embedded : {
item : [
{json of prod 1},
{json of prod 2}
]
}
}
See what i did there? an extra control for an extra state transition. JUST LIKE YOU WOULD DO IF YOU HAD A WEBPAGE. You'd probably put it in a pop up, well that's what the client of your app can do too with the result of that control.
It's really that simple...just think how you'd do it in HTML and do the same.
The big benefit here is that the client NEVER EVER needed to know a company or category id or ever plug that in to some template. The id's are implementation details, the client never knows they exist, they just executed Hypermedia controls..and that is RESTful.
Say I have a team object, that has a name property, a city property and a players property, where the players property is a an array of possibly many players. This is represented in an SQL database with a teams table and a players table, where each player has a name and a team_id.
Building a RESTful api based on this simple data-structure, I'm in doubt if there is a clear rule regarding, if the return object should/could include a list of players, when hitting /teams/:id ?
I have a view, that needs to show a team, and its players with their names, so:
1: Should /teams/:id join the two tables behind the scene and return the full team object, with a players property, that is an array of names and id's?
2: Should /teams/:id join the two tables behind the scene and return the team object, with a players property, that is an array of just id's that will then have to be queried one-by-one to /players/:id ?
3: Should two calls be made, one to /teams/:id and one to /teams/:id/players ?
4: Should a query string be used like this /teams/:id?fields=name,city,players ?
If either 2 or 3 is the way to go, how would one approach the situation, where a team could also have multiple cities, resulting in another cities table in the DB to keep it normalized? Should a new endpoint then be created at /teams/:id/cities.
When creating RESTful API's, is it the normalized datastructure in the DB that dictates the endpoints in the API?
Usually with a RESTful API, it is best that the use-cases dictate the endpoints of the API, not necessarily the data structure.
If you sometimes need just the teams, sometimes need just the players of a team, and sometimes need both together, I would have 3 distinct calls, probably something like /teams/:id, /players/:teamid and player-teams/:teamid (or something similar).
The reason you want to do it this way is because it minimizes the number of HTTP requests that need to be made for any given page. Of all of the typical performance issues, an inflated number of HTTP requests is usually one of the most common performance hits, and usually one of the easiest to avoid.
That being said, you also don't want to go so crazy that you create an over-inflated API. Think through the typical use cases and make calls for those. Don't just implement every possible combination you can think of just for the sake of it. Remember You Aren't Gonna Need It.
I'd suggest something like:
GET /teams
{
"id" : 12,
"name" : "MyTeam"
"players" :
{
"self" : "http://my.server/players?teamName=MyTeam"
},
"city" :
{
"self" : "http://my.server/cities/MyCity"
}
}
GET /cities
GET /cities/{cityId}
GET /players
GET /players/{playerId}
You can then use URIs to call out to get whatever other related resources you need. If you want the flexibility to embed values, you can use ?expand, such as:
GET /teams?expand=players
{
"id" : 12,
"name" : "MyTeam"
"players" :
{
"self" : "http://my.server/players?teamName=MyTeam",
[
{
"name" : "Mary",
"number" : "12"
},
{
"name" : "Sally",
"number" : "15"
}
]
},
"city" :
{
"self" : "http://my.server/cities/MyCity"
}
}