Explore the API with Postman

This is an optional step. It will help you better visualize what the clients are doing.

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Configure Postman

When Postman GETs hypermedia, you can click on the links to open a new request tab. Because the Event Buddy service has authentication, you must supply an Authorization: header for requests to be successful. It is a pain having to set this header for each request tab. Postman has a setting that makes this easier.

In the Postman menu: File->Settings->General, enable "Retain headers when clicking on links".

Now we can set the Authorization: header for our first GET request, and the header will follow with each link we click.

GET the root resource

In a request tab:

• select GET
• enter the url: http://localhost:2112
• click the request Headers and add this header:
  • Key:    Authorization
  • Value: Basic cm9vdDpwYXNzd29yZA==
• click Send

This will produce a JSON response (HAL actually) like this:

{
    "_links": {
        "self": {
            "href": "/",
            "title": "event-buddy root"
        },
        "logging": {
            "href": "/_logging",
            "title": "logging"
        },
        "settings": {
            "href": "/_settings",
            "title": "_settings"
        },
        "events": {
            "href": "/events",
            "title": "events"
        },
        "venues": {
            "href": "/venues",
            "title": "venues"
        },
        "registrations": {
            "href": "/registrations",
            "title": "registrations"
        },
        "accounts": {
            "href": "/accounts",
            "title": "accounts"
        }
    }
}

This is the root resource. As is typical for this type of API, it has no data - only links.

Follow the links

Hover over each of the href values. You will see Postman recognizes them as links.

Click on /venues. Postman opens a new tab to GET that URL. Click "Send" to see the venues related to the root resource.

This is a classic hypermedia response. It has the data you requested (the list of venues in an array named _items) and it has links (in an object named _links).

In the first venue's _links, find the link labelled events. Click on that href value to GET the events related to that venue.

Feel free to explore as you see fit.