REST and Hypermedia
External
Internal
Resource
Representation
Universal Resource Locator (URL)
Universal Resource Locator
Universal Resource Identifier (URI)
Universal Resource Identifier
Representational State Transfer (REST)
RWA page 32
Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension (MIME)
MIME is an internet standard that extends the format of e-mail to support text in character sets other then ASCII, non-text attachments, such as audio, video, images, application programs, etc., message bodies with multiple parts and header information in non-ASCII characters sets. MIME is specified in six linked RFCs: RFC 2045, RFC 2046, RFC 2047, RFC 4288, RFC 4289 and RFC 2049.
MIME is relevant to HTTP. The content types define by MIME are used in the definition of HTTP content. HTTP clients use MIME content type headers to indicate the desired application to process the specific type of content they send. HTTP servers insert MIME content type information in all their responses.
MIME defines the following headers:
- MIME-Version
- Content-Type
- Content-Disposition
- Content-Transfer-Encoding
Media Type
A media type, also called media-type, content type or MIME type is a two-part string identifying the format of a document. Usually, knowing a document's format allows us to parse it. IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) is the official authority for the standardization and publication of media types.
The media type string consists of a type and a subtype. The subtype can be further be structured into a tree. A media type can optionally define a suffix and parameters:
type "/" [tree "." ] subtype ["+" suffix] *[";" parameter]
The currently registered types are: "application", "audio", "example", "font", "image", "message", "model", "multipart", "text" and "video".
An HTML file may be designated as:
text/html; charset=UTF-8
Media Type Support
HTTP Protocol Semantics within a REST Application Context
GET
Get a representation of a resource.
Also see:
POST
Create a new resource underneath the current one, based on the given representation.
Also see:
PUT
Replace the state of the given resource with the one described in the given representation.
Also see:
DELETE
Destroy the resource.
Also see:
PATCH
Defined in RFC 5789.
Modifies part of the state of the given resource based on the given representation. If some bit of resource state is not mentioned in the representation, it should be left unmodified. PATCH is like PUT, but allows for fine-grained changes in resource state.
HEAD
Get the headers that would be sent along with a representation of this resource, but not the representation itself. This method is mostly used when a client explores the API.
Also see:
OPTIONS
Discover which methods this resource responds to. This method is mostly used when a client explores the API.
Also see: