What is REST (Representational State Transfer)

REST (Representational State Transfer) defines a set of architectural principles by which you can design Web services that focus on a system's resources. REST, which was first introduced by Roy Fielding (Univ. of California, Irvine) in the year 2000, is a simpler alternative to SOAP/WSDL based web services. A web service is said to be ‘RESTful’ when it is implemented using the principles of REST. Over the past couple of years web technology giants have started adopting REST and RESTful services heavily underscoring their significance.