SOAP to get rest with REST

Filed in archive Application Development on October 16, 2008

Sun has come up with JAR files for JAX-RS which is the new Java API for Representational State Transfer or REST Web Services. REST encodes information directly into URL which enables HTTP protocol to handle most of the pressure. It can be considered as a replacement for conventional SOAP practices.

JAX-RS makes the design process for RESTful Web services undemanding leading to an easier API to be written when compared with the Java Web Services APIs.

This is what Dr. Marc J. Hadley, senior staff engineer at Sun had to say about REST:

I think it's simpler. There's so much in HTTP that is still to be fully exploited. Without going to SOAP, there's so much you can already do that people don't realize. I can see there are cases where you can step up to SOAP. But JAX-RS is of the Web, whereas JAX-WS sort of inherits that SOAP thing where the Web is just a transport. JAX-WS is over the Web, rather of the Web.

You can download JAX-RS for free out here.