Resources and URLs

Part of the REST APIs section of Coddy's Node.js journey. Lesson 1 of 25.

Other programmers call your API from their code, so its addresses must be easy to guess. Most web APIs follow a style called REST: each address names a thing, a resource, and the HTTP method says what to do with it.

GET    /api/invoices      the list of invoices
GET    /api/invoices/7    invoice 7
POST   /api/invoices      add an invoice
DELETE /api/invoices/7    remove invoice 7

The path holds nouns, never verbs. With /api/getInvoices and /api/deleteInvoice?id=7, a client must learn a new word for every action. A router mounted with app.use('/api/invoices', invoices) answers both addresses: its '/' route is the list and its '/:id' route is one invoice. An id that matches nothing answers 404 with a JSON error, so the client reads it like any other answer.

Challenge

Easy

Mount the router in server.js at /api/tasks.
GET /api/tasks answers the array from store.js.
GET /api/tasks/:id answers one task, or 404 with { "error": "Task not found" }.

Press Run and send GET /api/tasks, GET /api/tasks/2 and GET /api/tasks/99.

Try it yourself

import { Router } from 'express';
import { tasks } from '../store.js';

const router = Router();

// Add a route for the whole list and a route for one task

export default router;