REST

The REST architectural style was first proposed by Roy Fielding in his doctoral dissertation in 2000

The core philosophy of Harness is 'everything is a plugin,' with models, tools, skills, sandboxes, and interfaces all freely combinable and replaceable; the framework core is written in REST, with over a hundred official plugins built in and an accompanying plugin store.

REST is an architectural style proposed by Roy Fielding in his 2000 doctoral dissertation 'Architectural Styles and the Design of Network-based Software Architectures'.

REST（Representational State Transfer）是Roy Fielding在2000年的博士论文中提出的一种软件架构风格

REST的六大约束条件包括：客户端-服务器分离、无状态性、可缓存性、统一接口、分层系统和按需代码（可选）

Stacking abstraction layers is a common pattern in software engineering: HTTP sits on top of TCP, REST sits on top of HTTP, and various SDKs sit on top of REST, with each layer not eliminating the layer below.

The API world suffers from fragmentation: different styles such as REST, GraphQL, and gRPC, and each vendor's naming conventions, authentication methods, and error code definitions all differ, which is extremely inefficient for AI models.

ElevenLabs' API uses a REST + JSON structure and is compatible with browser-side fetch calls.

Capabilities that need to be dynamically discovered by AI or triggered by natural-language-described intent are suitable for exposure via MCP; fixed machine-to-machine calls between systems and scenarios with strict requirements on latency or throughput should go directly through traditional APIs such as REST or gRPC.

For a single, simple, one-off integration requirement, writing a REST interface directly may be more lightweight than adopting MCP.

REST remains the dominant API style, GraphQL is increasingly popular in scenarios requiring flexible queries, and gRPC is widely adopted in microservice communication for its high performance and strongly typed contracts.

The core design philosophy of SCIM is to use REST-style HTTP interfaces combined with a JSON-format resource model to replace proprietary solutions previously used in enterprise directory synchronization.

Roborock vacuum cleaners report cleaning status in real time, receive commands, and synchronize sensor data via the MQTT channel, while obtaining map data and updating device configuration via the REST interface.

The second step of the solution is to fully replicate Roborock's backend technology stack, including the MQTT messaging channel and REST interface.

In the in-engine AI invocation pattern, the application only needs to call a single stored procedure and pass in a prompt; the stored procedure queries data, initiates the REST call, and returns the result entirely within the engine.

Internal REST interfaces carry no versioning guarantees and are not protected by service agreements; vendors can modify or shut them down at any time, making them less stable than officially public APIs.

REST (Representational State Transfer) interfaces are the most mainstream data interaction standard for current web applications.

REST uses standard HTTP methods (GET/POST/PUT/DELETE) to operate on resources, paired with the JSON data format.

SOAP pursued universal interoperability through strict XML Schema and WSDL descriptions and was ultimately replaced by the more lightweight REST style due to excessive complexity

The HTTP protocol itself is stateless, and the success of the REST architecture validates the maturity of stateless design in distributed systems.