Chapter 1. Introducing the Restlet Framework
This chapter covers
- Writing your first Restlet client and server programs
- Restlet’s features and benefits
- Overview of the Restlet Framework, an open source REST framework for Java
Let’s say you headed a team that built a new kind of email service. It was a web application written in Java that made heavy use of servlets, and although initially it worked fine, it didn’t scale well to larger loads when launched in the cloud. Your team had trouble responding to requests to expose the service to clients other than a browser using a SOAP-based web services stack. As a result, your service lost ground to more scalable and interoperable systems; your team was disbanded; and you were let go.
You’re okay—you found a similar position at a better company with a shorter commute. Only one problem: the first thing they want you to do is head a team building...a new kind of email service! You don’t want to repeat the same mistakes this time around.
What were those mistakes, anyway? You’re pretty sure it wasn’t the choice of programming language. You needed the type-safety, the rich built-in library, and the access to powerful open source libraries that Java developers enjoy. Besides, Java is your core expertise, and it was easy to find competent Java programmers for your team. It wasn’t that servlets didn’t perform as promised, and it wasn’t due to bad programming practices. In fact, it’s hard to pinpoint any specific mistakes.