How to Design a REST API for Linked Data Using ServiceStack?

Design of building ServiceStack linked data REST API

Introduction

When designing an API for correlating multiple types of data, it is critical to determine the most appropriate organizational structure. This article explores a recommended REST API design strategy for handling situations where there is a parent-child relationship in the data, such as comments related to an event, location, or thing.

Logical URL structure

To simplify API navigation and maintain a hierarchical organization, we recommend using a URL structure that reflects the data entities:

<code>/parent-type/id/child-type/</code>

For event-related comments, this will translate to:

<code>/event/1/reviews/</code>

This URL scheme provides the logical context for accessing comments associated with a specific event.

Achievement

ServiceStack service application:

ServiceStack services provide a decoupled design approach, allowing you to separate service implementation from custom routing. This flexibility enables you to expose services under any desired URL.

Message-based design:

We recommend adopting a message-based design for API operations. This improves clarity and logical grouping by defining different messages for each operation type.

Example:

For event comments, the following services can be defined:

<code>[Route("/events/{EventId}/reviews", "GET")]
public class GetEventReviews : IReturn<GetEventReviewsResponse>
{
    // 可选结果集过滤器的属性
}

[Route("/events/{EventId}/reviews/{Id}", "GET")]
public class GetEventReview : IReturn<EventReview>
{
    // 用于标识特定评论的属性
}</code>

This implementation is consistent with the recommended URL structure and provides clear, type-specific endpoints for accessing event comments.

Physical Project Structure

In order to maintain a clean and scalable project structure, we recommend separating the service implementation and DTO into dedicated projects. This separation simplifies code management and allows service definitions and DTOs to be deployed independently.

Suggestion:

• Parent project (e.g., EventMan): AppHost and entry point
• Service interface project (e.g., EventMan.ServiceInterface): Service implementation
• Logic projects (e.g., EventMan.Logic): C# logic, data models, external dependencies
• Service model projects (e.g., EventMan.ServiceModel): DTO and request/response types

Adopting this project structure can improve readability, maintainability and code sharing capabilities.

Conclusion

By using a hierarchical URL structure, implementing message-based services, and following a structured project layout, you can create well-organized and efficient REST APIs for linked data scenarios.

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