Book Image

RESTful Web API Design with Node.js 10 - Third Edition

By : Valentin Bojinov
Book Image

RESTful Web API Design with Node.js 10 - Third Edition

By: Valentin Bojinov

Overview of this book

When building RESTful services, it is really important to choose the right framework. Node.js, with its asynchronous, event-driven architecture, is exactly the right choice for building RESTful APIs. This third edition of RESTful Web API Design with Node.js 10 will teach you to create scalable and rich RESTful applications based on the Node.js platform. You will be introduced to the latest NPM package handler and understand how to use it to customize your RESTful development process. You will begin by understanding the key principle that makes an HTTP application a RESTful-enabled application. After writing a simple HTTP request handler, you will create and test Node.js modules using automated tests and mock objects; explore using the NoSQL database, MongoDB, to store data; and get to grips with using self-descriptive URLs. You’ll learn to set accurate HTTP status codes along with understanding how to keep your applications backward-compatible. Also, while implementing a full-fledged RESTful service, you will use Swagger to document the API and implement automation tests for a REST-enabled endpoint with Mocha. Lastly, you will explore some authentication techniques to secure your application.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)
Title Page
Copyright and Credits
Packt Upsell
Contributors
Preface
Index

Summary


Congratulations! In this chapter, you succeeded in transforming a sample REST-enabled endpoint into a full-fledged RESTful web service that supports filtering for usability and paging for easy navigation. The service delivers both arbitrary and JSON data, and it is ready for high-load scenarios, as it enables caching in its critical parts. One thing that should draw your attention is the appropriate usage of the HTTP status codes when it comes to redirection between new and obsolete versions of any public API.

Implementing appropriate HTTP status is really important for the REST application, so we made use of rather exotic statuses, such as 301 Moved Permanently and 302 Found. In the next chapter, we will introduce the concept of authorization into our application.