What is REST API? | Confluent [Video]

What is REST?

A Representational State Transfer, or REST, is a standard that guides the design and development of the processes that allow us to interact with (create, read, update, and delete) data stored on web servers. In other words, REST simplifies communication with data on a server by providing hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) methods that can be used to perform various interactions with data on web servers.

With REST, you can communicate with servers using HTTP protocol. Because this is designed for usage on the largest scale—the Internet—the coupling between the client and the origin server has to be as loose as possible to allow for the scale.

The Elements of REST

There are six elements that guide REST. When applied to the system’s architecture, these impart performance, scalability, simplicity, modifiability, visibility, portability, and reliability: