REST, the REpresentational State Transfer, is the architectural style underlying the HTTP protocol. In the last couple of years, REST has emerged as a compelling and simpler alternative to SOAP/WSDL-based distributed architectures. In this session, Arjen will explain what REST is, how it can be used to build Web Services, and where it makes sense to use. We will start by giving an overview of REST: where did it come from, how does it work, and how can it be used to build a distributed architecture? Using illustrative examples, we will try to find an answer to these questions. Next, we look at some of the current frameworks and tools which can be used to build web services. We will look at Spring-MVC and JSR-311 (also known as JAXRS) on the server-side, and also investigate client-side options, such as the plain HttpURLConnection, and the more mature Commons HttpClient.
Arjen Poutsma is a senior consultant at SpringSource with more than ten years' experience in commercial software environments. During this time he has worked with both Java EE and Microsoft .NET. Three years ago, Arjen started to specialize in Web Services and Service Oriented Architectures. During this period, he has worked for some of the largest organizations in the world helping them better understand enterprise Java and how SOAs fit into their organizations. In part from his experiences with these organizations, Arjen founded the open source Spring Web Services project and continues to lead the technical direction and development as the project lead for Spring Web Services. This project aims at facilitating development of document-driven web services.
Arjen has also contributed to various other open source projects, including XFire, NEO and others. He is a regular speaker at Java and SOA conferences, including Devoxx, The Spring Experience, JavaZone, W-JAX, and many others.
