There have been many ways to build software in the last few decades. With RAD (Rapid Application Development ) to SOA and to microservices. With Cloud gaining popularity and reachable to smaller to medium size companies, Software As A Service (SaaS) Solutions are the de facto way today to develop products.
Until recently, the traditional code-first approach to software development led the field. However, as organizations were moving to the cloud and adopting cloud services, an API-first approach came to the forefront. It has since proven to be an effective way to add more clarity and flexibility to the development process, supporting a reactive event-driven programming model.
REST APIs are becoming some of the most critical factors in tech development. Be it mobile applications, cloud apps, or even automated business functions; REST APIs have a ton of usage in this domain. Moreover, it is continuously growing with every passing day.
Computer Scientist Roy Fielding formulated REST and Its principles in the year 2000, and they are becoming the de facto standard of catering to the complex needs of today’s software development. They are omnipresent and are the first choice for development, integration between systems, etc.
REST APIs or Representational State Transfer is written to perform and receive requests through HTTP. With this, you can benefit from the preexisting protocols for your Web API.
But over time, with the increasing complexity of the software application and the growing popularity of microservices, REST APIs are becoming the de facto standard of catering to the complex needs of today’s software development.
REST APIs are beneficial for developers. Their numerous applications and advanced approaches help in many areas. However, many developers get carried away with this type of design. This is because the possibilities are endless, and if you fail to follow basic rules, you might land in hot waters.
Restful APIs, based on HTTP protocol, are becoming increasingly popular among developers, significantly after microservices have been rising in popularity in the past 4-5 years. The SOAP-based APIs used in Service Oriented Architecture has been popular since 2000.
Developers must remember that merely providing data and processing it correctly is insufficient. This will not determine whether you built your REST API right or not.
You must remember that many users will try your application, and if it is not convenient for them to use, you have failed.
While calling these REST APIs, the client should properly understand what happened to his request. Did it succeed or fail? If it failed, then what went wrong?
This information helps clients handle the response properly and build a better user experience around them. The responses from the APIs should be an essential part of your API design process.
Now that you know just how vital API response codes are let us take a closer look at them. This article will better make you understand which response codes to integrate into your REST API design and discover some of the most common mistakes you can avoid while building your REST API!
Overview of HTTP Error Codes
Understanding Response Codes
To make sense of response codes, first, you need to use them right. There might be over 70 HTTP codes, but most developers do not memorize all of them. The efficient way to use HTTP response codes is to keep them in a small subset.
That way, developers can focus on building apps and connecting them appropriately to standard-based codes. Consider Google GData API, which has ten response codes, or Digg, which has eight.
What is the Ideal Number of Codes?
The magic number for codes will vary from developer to developer. However, to begin with, think of the results of the interaction between API and an app. There can typically be only three:
- It works.
- The application makes a mistake.
- API makes a mistake.
What does this mean? Well, to put it simply, you can start with as little as three codes. Ensure to use the following:
- 200 – OK
- 400 – Bad Request
- 500 – Internal Server Error
Once you add these three essential codes, you are free to add others you require. That said, it is best not to go beyond eight.
Response Code Rules
When deciding which codes to use, you also want to remember specific rules related to them. Here are a few of them:
- Do not use 200 (OK) to communicate errors. Never compromise a Rest API merely for the comfort of less sophisticated clients. Use codes the right way and according to their specification.
- Use 400 (Bad Request) for non-specific failures. For general client errors, the 400 code is appropriate. Typically, you use this code when no other 4xx error code fits the bill. Errors in the 4xx subset can explain the client’s mistake in the response body.
- Use 500 (Internal Server Error) for API malfunction. A 500 error can never be a mistake on the client’s part. For this reason, users will often retry the same request that caused the response in the first place. This code is the general Rest API error response when web frameworks deal with unusual request handler codes.
Key Takeaways
- The best way to make sense of your Rest APIs’ codes is to reduce them in number. Keep their subset short and sweet, and expand your knowledge of these codes as much as possible. That includes being aware of the dos and don’ts of these responses.
- Fewer response codes also make it easier for the clients to know what has become of their request.
Along with ensuring the correct response code, you should avoid these 7 mistakes to ensure your REST APIs can be consumed quickly.
7 Common Mistakes That Can Ruin Your REST Apis
Below are some of the most apparent errors you can avoid while creating your REST API.
1. API Response Codes
HTTP responses are crucial to ensure the working of your application. These responses need not always be successful ones. You will need to focus on error responses to make sure you know how your application is faring online.
Most developers limit themselves to a few errors. Unless you know the responses, you will not tweak the program and make any necessary changes. You will also have difficulty sending vital information to your users without error responses.
Knowing about HTTP response status codes will help developers improve their applications significantly. HTTP response codes are a response to a request made to the server. So, the particular HTTP status code tells us if the HTTP request was accomplished.
The HTTP responses are generally classified into five main categories. For instance, informational HTTP responses are codes from 100-199, which show that the request was successfully acquired and understood.
Successful HTTP responses are between 200-299, which means that the request was received, understood, and successfully accepted by the server.
Redirects are from 300-399, which tells the client they must complete one more action to complete their request to the server. Errors from the client side are client errors HTTP response codes from 400 to 499. From 500 and 599 are server errors that specify that the request was successfully accepted, but an error caused it from being fulfilled.
The HTTP response codes shown to users need to be easy to understand. They must have sufficient context so that it is comprehensible.
2. Validate Data
This may sound like a relatively common thing to do. However, many developers overlook this step and end up ruining their entire REST API design. Programmers must add data validation to their to-do lists and prioritize it.
This is because no matter how significant your operations are, someone is always a possibility of messing up. You might consider your application to be a brick wall. However, eventually, someone will find a gap in it.
If you do not validate all the Data you input, there are chances that your API will break in the future. This will have nothing to do with the way you designed it. Making this small error where you forget to validate your data could have severe and frustrating consequences.
For instance, it might break when a user enters an empty value in a non-obligatory field where a value is needed. You can quickly avert such situations by validating all the Data you input in your application as a programmer.
3. Estimating The Scale
Another important factor that your application cannot do without is scalability. When developing a program, you have an estimated user number. You design your product with this in mind. This way, all the operations run smoothly as long as only these many people use the program.
What most developers choose to ignore is the potential growth of their programs. You can start small, but it is also essential to consider how much your application will grow. If your platform is not scalable, you will face many difficulties scaling in the future.
A scalable platform will allow you to grow with ease. You must first pick a scalable server and separate the application layers quickly. Make sure you do not make any rigid decisions that cannot be changed in the future.
You do not want to use two or more servers once your application grows. It is a complicated process that creates a blunder in even the simplest of operations. In such cases, you can try file synchronization. However, it is not too fruitful either. The best way to avoid such a problem is to store files received by users in a remote location. You can also store these files by uploading them to a shared file location.
Today, cloud computing is becoming increasingly popular for hosting your applications. The most popular ones, viz. Microsoft Azure, AWS, and Google Cloud give you scalability with just the click of a button. They can even do the auto-scaling when your application/REST APIs meet an unexpected load.
Thinking cloud or some other mechanism for scaling when the demand increases can save your APIs from potentially failing when the load increases.
4. Assuming APIs Are A Single Request And Single Response Interaction
Visualize your API as an end-to-end program. You cannot expect this intricate application only to have a single request and response interaction. You can test you’re API by using a single endpoint call and analyzing the HTTP status.
The popular BDD/TDD method is not of great help either. Just because the requirement specifications for your API are met, your application is not perfect. A lot goes into it, and you need to test it out more efficiently.
The best way to do this is by ensuring you test your application as an end-user would. You must see how your application performs in real-time with external factors like traffic on the platform. You know your application is proper when there is easy integration!
5. Document Your APIs
Documenting everything you do might be way more important than you think. This is because you need to focus on your customers and users instead of just developing the application.
Generally speaking, developers will be the primary demographic to learn how to use it. So, it would be best if you had an easy-to-understand and easy-to-grasp application. You can trust your employees to know precisely what they are doing for a certain period.
Over time, the people working for you might change. Moreover, it is also possible that the application’s functions might slip your employee’s mind. It is a prevalent human error that can be easily avoided.
Make sure you write everything down and document your processes. This way, you can have a note of the way your application works too. It will be easier for you to identify any discrepancies in its function.
If you feel like doing this on your own is a tedious task, you can seek help from reliable preexisting solutions. You can opt for solutions like RAML, NelmioApiDoc, or Swagger to get your job done!
6. Monitoring Your APIs
Given that your application is your ultimate priority. However, this does not mean that your API design is flawless if the application runs correctly. The API design is the foundation of your application. If you ignore errors in the design, it is not long before your application fails.
Whenever there is a problem in your application, you must look into its foundation. Troubleshooting problems are done right from the base design of the application. You will need to get into the API, GUI application, and integration layer to figure out where the problem lies.
If you know your API inside out, you will have no trouble fixing this problem. Moreover, if you focus on your API right from the start, you will significantly reduce any issues that might occur in your application.
To illustrate: if a bug is found in the requirements-gathering phase, the cost could be $100. If the product owner doesn’t see that bug until the QA testing phase, the price could be $1500. If it’s not found until production, the cost could be $10,000.
And if the bug is never found, it could secretly cost the company money. A 2003 study commissioned by the Department of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology found that software bugs cost the US economy $59.5 billion annually.
7. Time Efficiency
Using time efficiently should be one of your top-most priorities when you build the application. You must ensure that your application’s most time-consuming operations are rectified.
This is one of the most common and frustrating errors made by developers. If your application takes much time to load, your user will lose interest. Keep your application nifty and efficient by delegating tasks.
The easiest way to do this is by making an external processor handle tedious tasks like sending emails and uploading pictures. This way, your HTTP is free instantly, and all the other processes can go smoothly without wasting too much of your user’s time.
Key Takeaways
There are a large number of errors that most developers commonly make while building their REST API. This is not because you lack the skill. However, because many other essential tasks need to be undertaken, you often overlook these mistakes.
Make sure you are thorough with your API design if you want your application to run smoothly. What’s more, the errors mentioned above can be easily rectified with a simple revision done by the programmer. So, be vigilant with your development and focus on your REST API as you would on your final application!