Question

I want to build a simple API that can be accessed by myself in other clients. I want to use Rails 3 to build it but I do not know how to do it. I know that Rails got this more or less build in but I do not know how to interact with it.

Is there any resources on the Internet that I can read up on how to turn my Rails 3 application into a server with a remote API?

Thankful for all input.

Answer 1

a good starting point might be reading up on REST and responders

Then to interact with the API from another rails app, you can use ActiveResource. There’s a Railscast on it.

An example:

#API side
class ProductsController < ApplicationController
  respond_to :json

  def index
    @products = Product.all
    respond_with(@products)
  end
end

#Client
# models/product.rb
class Product < ActiveResource::Base
  self.site = "http://your-api-app.com"
end