I used to do all XML with XStream, but now due to deprecation I’m forced to switch to JSON for two APIs, one of which is a Google API. Since there’s this google-api-java-client that should work well on Android and allows to do this in a record number of very few lines of code, I’m probably going to use this.
Yaniv’s Google I/O 2011 presentation is still ringing in my ear:
This library is basically designed for any API on the Web. … Why would you want to use a different library with one vendor, and a different library for another vendor? Ideally, you’d like a library that would work with pretty much any API and have a consistent experience.
True. So here’s my question: How can I reuse parts of this library for similar but non-Google APIs and make my life easier? Does anyone have any experience with this, or code samples?
The other API uses JSON. I’m talking about very simple REST calls that anonymously get data (i.e. no API keys or OAuth). No advanced stuff. I’d be happy to build my own model classes and of course realize they’d not be available. I’m probably an intermediate level developer when it comes to REST. I’ll be using two different transport methods, and two different JSON parsers, based on Android SDK level.
Edit: Yup, implementing the client for the Google API was a breeze, except for wrestling with the new quota limits.
It’s hard to say which components you can reuse and how you can reuse without having seen the API 🙂
I’d probably start by pointing the client directly at the new API and inspecting what breaks. If after digging around with the debugger the problems do not look too bad, I’d tweak the client as necessary.
However, if you’re really just reading from a simple rest API, you may not find a whole lot of benefit from attempting to reuse the Google client. An HTTP client combined with a JSON parser like Jackson may be sufficient and less complex.
~~Jenny