The new design of logical network 'usages' collection came out a bit problematic or shall i say annoying. The idea is to send the entire collection elements every time a user wants to update a single usage otherwise the missing elements will be automatically removed from the collection.
Example: having <usages><usage>VM</usage><usages> 1. in order to add 'display' usage to the collection i must send 'vm' as well. 2. to remove an element from the collection, i must send the entire collection without the desired element (note: in this case it is only one extra element for every update but in other cases it could be much more)
Yep, this seems to conflict with the general idiom around the interpretation of missing properties in a PUT representation - i.e. any properties omitted from the representation are ignored and not changed.
The solution should be: <usages><vm>true</vm><display>false</display></usages> That way we can send a single usage having different boolean text without including the entire collection elements.
I wonder would a POST/DELETE idiom be more natural, if the individual usages would be pressed into service as a psuedo-OID, e.g: POST .../networks/network_id/usages HTTP/1.1 <usage id="VM"/> 201 Created Location: .../networks/network_id/usages/VM <usage id="VM" href=".../networks/network_id/usages/VM"/> -- GET .../networks/network_id/usages HTTP/1.1 200 OK Location: .../networks/network_id/usages/VM <usages> <usage id="VM" href=".../networks/network_id/usages/VM"/> </usages> -- POST .../networks/network_id/usages HTTP/1.1 <usage id="display"/> 201 Created Location: .../networks/network_id/usages/display <usage id="display" href=".../networks/network_id/usages/display"/> -- GET .../networks/network_id/usages HTTP/1.1 200 OK <usages> <usage id="VM" href=".../networks/network_id/usages/VM"/> <usage id="display" href=".../networks/network_id/usages/display"/> <usages> -- DELETE .../networks/network_id/usages/VM 204 No Content -- GET .../networks/network_id/usages HTTP/1.1 200 OK <usages> <usage id="display" href=".../networks/network_id/usages/display"/> <usages> So from each usage would appear like a first class resource from the perspective of the creation/deletion idiom. If the client providing the ID is considered inconsistent, this could be a "name" child element instead, e.g.: POST .../networks/network_id/usages HTTP/1.1 <usage> <name>display</name> </usage> 201 Created Location: .../networks/network_id/usages/display <usage id="display" href=".../networks/network_id/usages/display"> <name>display</name> </usage> Cheers, Eoghan