CODEWITHSUNDEEP
djangorestarchitectureproject
Alien13
Alien13

Reputation: 618

Django - Connecting project apps with only REST API

I mainly have two questions. I haven't read this anywhere but, I am wondering whether or not it is a good idea to make it so that all the data that is going in and out of all apps in your project solely depended on REST API calls.

So that if you, for instance, want to register a new user. Gather the data from a front-end, with no back-end work, and just send this data as a REST call to you "registration-app" where all validation and back-end work is done.

I find this method effective when working in big teams as it makes dependencies even more decoupled, as well as making each part of the project more separated and "clear". My question is, therefore, is this a viable way of developing? Are there any security or performance issues with this? And where can I read more?

Thanks

Max

Upvotes: 0

Views: 47

Answers (1)

the4thamigo_uk
the4thamigo_uk

Reputation: 875

It is perfectly viable, I think like most choices it has pros and cons. Here are some of them:

Pros:

  • Decoupling - Clients depend on the abstraction (i.e. the REST API) rather than the concretion (i.e. the website), so you gain clarity of design, ability to test outside of the browser, and you can do things like substitute the REST API with different implementations e.g. with a mock service for development/testing purposes. If, in addition, the REST API is implemented by a separate back-end service, then you can update it independently, and potentially scale it independently.
  • Responsive user-interface - The REST requests can avoid HTML page reloads and improve UX. Also you can make asynchronous REST calls.
  • Reduced payload - Typically the REST calls would return less data than the HTML sent in a page refresh.

Cons:

  • More complex client - You require more complex javascript and especially so if you employ asynchronous REST calls.
  • Dynamic page building - Typically the result of a REST call might require some change in the UI, you are forced to do this dynamically in javascript which also adds complication. So your UI logic is split between your HTML page templates and your javascript UI updates. This makes the UI hard to reason about.
  • Timeouts - You need to handle timeouts and errors in javascript
  • Sessions - You need some means of authenticating users and maintaining sessions. REST services should not maintain client-session state themselves, so you either need to store state in the client, or explicitly add state as a new REST resource with its own distinct URI(s).
  • Forced page reload - If you use this mechanism to avoid page reloads, then users potentially might have the page open for a significant period of time, and you might need some kind of mechanism to cause them to reload it.

Upvotes: 1

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