jaxrs-client-in-a-nutshell

The original intention of this little project was to get familiar with the JAX-RS client API. The next step was to provide a simple layer of abstraction for using this API: this lightweight framework.

How should a developer interact with the framework? Let's show an example:

URI baseUri = ... // set your base URI here, e. g. "http://resources.company.com"
RestServiceClient restClient = DefaultRestServiceClient.newInstance(baseUri);
restClient.openConversation();

// read a specific resource, here some kind of a generic item identified by its id '24'
restClient.setPath("items/24");
Item item24 = restClient.read(Item.class);

// modify item24 in between... finally updating the modified item
restClient.update(item24);

restClient.closeConversation();

There are couple of things to know of "what's behind the curtain". The code above relies on the default mediaType of a RestServiceClient which is application/json. The class Item is a simple JAXB annotated POJO that represents the content of a JAX-RS conversation. There is neither an authentication mechanism nor any explicit exception handling considered.

The current scope of the framework provides methods to

• create a resource (using a POST request)
• read a single resource (using a GET request)
• read a list of resources (using a GET request)
• update a resource (using a PUT request)
• delete a resource (using a DELETE request)

The list of things which are currently NOT supported is by far longer than the feature list. Still work in progress...