In this chapter, you will know the reasons why it is necessary to interact with your backend database using an intermediary service. You also take a look at the middle-tier architecture, designing RESTful like API, implementing a RESTful like hypermedia API using Node.js, and handling authentication using Passport. You also learn about building API handlers.
The following are important links to references on REST and its features:
HTTP methods: http://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec9.html
Representational State Transfer: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representational_state_transfer
RESTful HTTP methods: http://www.restapitutorial.com/lessons/httpmethods.html
Hypermedia as the Engine of Application State: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HATEOAS
Good examples of Hypermedia APIs: http://apievangelist.com/2014/04/15/what-are-some-good-examples-of-hypermedia-apis/
Passport authentication strategies: https://github.com/jaredhanson/passport/wiki/Strategies
The PAW REST client (Commercial, OS X, $19.99): https://luckymarmot.com/paw
The Firefox REST client: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/restclient/
The Chrome REST client: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/advanced-rest-client/hgmloofddffdnphfgcellkdfbfbjeloo?hl=en-USWizTools
RESTClient (Java): https://github.com/wiztools/rest-client