Should a RESTful 'PUT' operation return something

resources rest service put
AwkwardCoder picture AwkwardCoder · Apr 28, 2009 · Viewed 220.4k times · Source

I was wondering what people's opinions are of a RESTful PUT operation that returns nothing (null) in the response body.

Answer

system PAUSE picture system PAUSE · May 5, 2009

The HTTP specification (RFC 2616) has a number of recommendations that are applicable. Here is my interpretation:

  • HTTP status code 200 OK for a successful PUT of an update to an existing resource. No response body needed. (Per Section 9.6, 204 No Content is even more appropriate.)
  • HTTP status code 201 Created for a successful PUT of a new resource, with the most specific URI for the new resource returned in the Location header field and any other relevant URIs and metadata of the resource echoed in the response body. (RFC 2616 Section 10.2.2)
  • HTTP status code 409 Conflict for a PUT that is unsuccessful due to a 3rd-party modification, with a list of differences between the attempted update and the current resource in the response body. (RFC 2616 Section 10.4.10)
  • HTTP status code 400 Bad Request for an unsuccessful PUT, with natural-language text (such as English) in the response body that explains why the PUT failed. (RFC 2616 Section 10.4)

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