What if you need state for users without username and password? For instance let them add things to their cart and only require registraton/login once they buy

What if you need state for users without username and password? For instance let them add things to their cart and only require registraton/login once they buy. What if you want more than one basket? What if baskets are shared among users. Replace "basket" with "state" for above. How is http://example.org/shop/users/johndoe/basket http://example.org/shop/users/johndoe/basket different/better than http://example.org/shop/users/johndoe/?sessionkey=123456 http://example.org/shop/users/johndoe/?sessionkey=123456 or http://example.org/shop/baskets/123456/ http://example.org/shop/baskets/123456/ "differ from storing the cart in a user session" I never store anything but sessions in user sessions, carts go in the cart table/whatever. Carts may have a session_id they are associated with, but they are probably keyed to user instead(depends). Probably stored in a cookie(state on the client). Not saying author is wrong, I just don't get it. And how come rest folks don't end their resources with a '/'. like http://example.com/users/bob/ http://example.com/users/bob/ The "root" resource ends in a slash. http://example.com/ http://example.com/ Having that be inconsistent with other resources always bugs me. I tend to have verbs not end in slash. http://example.com/users/bob/delete http://example.com/users/bob/delete Very consistent and orderly to my obcom mind.