RESTful Interface Description

The other day, a friend from Oz asked about IDL (interface definition language) for RESTful services (it turns out WSDL 2.0 has binding definitions that support all HTTP methods) and now there is this post from Phil Windley Crying Out for a RESTful Service Interface Description Language:

The only way that we’ll get to a place where Web 2.0 apps are more easily integrated is when we have a service interface description language and other metadata standards for RESTful services.

At the top of the post he links to another blog by Dave Rosenberg that says in part "To me the big opportunity of Web 2.0 development is the ability to create a better user experience based on features etc."

Following Phil's post is a comment starting with "What we need is a [...]".

Here's a suggestion - pick two services you would like to integrate, something that would result in real tangible value that you would actually use day-to-day, and try actually implementing these difficult integrations (and some are tricky) and write about the effort and the problems. That real effort with real implementation will surface the real problems that need solving. Crying out "you should do this" or "people need that" is just so much wishful theory talking.

In theory there is no difference between theory and practice. In practice there is.