REST API Error handling

REST API Error handling

In this article we saw, in general, which HTTP methods and status code to use in CRUD operation.

Now let’s see better which http status code to use in our API.

There are more than 70 status code, but I suggest to use only the common ones.

HTTP Status code	When to use
200 OK	all GET, PUT, DELETE
201 Created	after insert (POST)
400 Bad Request	Client wrong params
404 Not Found	during a GET and the object is not found
401 Not Authorized
403 Forbidden
500 Internal Server Error	in every back end issue

Standard Error Template

{
  text: "message",
  timestamp: new Date(),
  method: httpMethod,
  endpoit: endpointInformation,
  errors: [
    {
      code: codeSpecificApplication, 
      text: "errorMessage",
      hints: ["hints to help the user", "hint 2", ...],
      info: "Link to more info"
}
  ],
  payload: {request payload} (optional, just for debug)
}