mca blog

It's been just over a year since O’Reilly released my Building Hypermedia APIs with HTML5 and Node and more than two years since I first started work on the early drafts. Inspired by the important 2007 book RESTful Web Services" by Leonard Richardson and Sam Ruby, I wanted to produce something that would - like the Richardson/Ruby book - offer a clear mode of evaluation, establish shared understanding, and promote a meaningful dialog about designing and implementing solutions on the Web. I'd hoped for some level of success and expected a healthy amount of skepticism. What I didn't foresee was the encouragement and support I received from Leonard as he read my early drafts. He offered great advice on improving the book and, even though I wasn't able to implement all his suggestions, I know the book benefited greatly from his attention. As I did, too.

Now, I have the even greater privilege of working with Leonard and Sam on a new book - "RESTful Web APIs". It’s scheduled for completion by the end of Q1 2013 and should be available soon after. The preliminary discussions and early drafts are exciting and I am hard-pressed to keep up with the already rapid pace of development on the book.

Leonard has written an extensive post on both the background behind this new book and the current state of affairs vis-a-vis APIs, hypermedia, and the Web. I’ll leave that discussion in his capable hands. What I will say here is that this new book is not just a "2nd Edition" of Leonard and Sam’s "RESTful Web Services"; It's more of a "follow-up" seven years on. It will contain the same chronicling of the current challenges facing Web developers and architects as well as a collection of up-to-date guidance on designing and building solutions for the today’s Web.

I'm really looking forward to the work ahead and to feedback from those reading our early drafts and helping us test our code and our ideas. It’s going to be quite a project!