What is RESTful API ?

A typical RESTful API (Representational State Transfer Application Programming Interface) is an architectural style for creating web services that uses HTTP requests to perform operations such as creating, reading, updating, and deleting resources.

RESTful APIs are stateless, meaning each request is independent and contains all the information necessary to complete the request. The API exposes resources with unique URIs, and uses standard HTTP methods (GET, POST, PUT, DELETE) to perform operations on those resources.

A RESTful API returns data in different formats such as JSON or XML, and follows a set of rules and constraints, known as REST constraints, which include:

• Client-server architecture
• Stateless communication
• Cacheability of resources
• Layered system architecture
• Uniquely identifiable resources through URIs
• Common set of HTTP methods (GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, etc.) to perform operations on resources
• Hypertext as the engine of application state (HATEOAS)
• RESTful APIs are widely used in modern web development and have become the standard for building web services - that respond to client requests.