>Instead of a list of methods, you get a list of methods (which do not have to stay the same, by the way) and a tree of resources. Theoretically you should be a

>Instead of a list of methods, you get a list of methods (which do not have to stay the same, by the way) and a tree of resources. Theoretically you should be able to crawl a REST API using only the document types and the root URL, I don't think I've ever seen a "public" API letting me that. Oh yes you have. Ever browsed a ftp server with your browser? That is a REST API, using HTTP and FTP for transportation and HTML and WHATEVER for the actual data. You can start from the root of the server (or more commonly, from /pub/) and crawl through the file hierarchy as much as you like. But your point is valid. Not many APIs allow to "crawl" the data, even though one of the four guiding principles for interface is: Hypermedia as the engine of application state "If it is likely that the client will want to access related resources, these should be identified in the representation returned, for example by providing their URIs in sufficient context, such as hypertext links." REST is an architecture style, not a protocol. HTTP is protocol well suited for use in a RESTful system. The API in question violates REST (atleast) by not using the methods provided by HTTP.