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Asked: 2026-06-11T05:36:07+00:00

I am struggling (in some sense) to determine which HTTP method is more appropriate

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I am struggling (in some sense) to determine which HTTP method is more appropriate for rebooting a remote resource: GET or PUT?

On one hand, it seems more semantic to call http://tools.serviceprovider.net/canopies/d34db33fc4f3?reboot=true because one might want to GET a representation of a freshly rebooted canopy.

On the other hand, a reboot is not ‘safe’ (nor is it necessarily idempotent, but then a canopy or modem is not just a row in a database) so it might seem more semantic to PUT the canopy into a state of rebooting, then have the server return a 202 to indicate that the reboot was initiated and is processing.

I have been reading up on HTTP/1.1, REST, HATEOAS, and other related concepts over the last week, so I am still putting the pieces together. Could a more seasoned developer please weigh in and confirm or dispel my hunch?

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  1. Editorial Team

    A GET doesn’t seem appropriate because a GET is expected, like you said, to be “safe”. i.e. no action other than retrieval.

    A PUT doesn’t seem appropriate because a PUT is expected to be idempotent. i.e. multiple identical operations cause same side-effects as as a single operation. Moreover, a PUT is usually used to replace the content at the request URI with the request body.

    A POST appears most appropriate here. Because:

    1. A POST need not be safe
    2. A POST need not be idempotent

    It also appears meaningful in that you are POSTing a request for a reboot (much like submitting a form, which also happens via POST), which can then be processed, possibly leading to a new URI containing reboot logs/results returned along with a 303 See Other status code.

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