nopCommerce REST Service Plugin

Hi all,

I am starting an open-source plugin that allows nopCommerce to expose REST service. This allows third-party apps to make calls to nopCommerce to insert / retrieve data.

The plugin is currently in early stage, so I am looking for contribution. I've setup the basic structure and added some sample codes, but I need your help to add codes for other CRUD operations.

Anyone interested is welcomed to checkout https://noprest.codeplex.com.

Helps appreciated!

Regards,
Woon Cherk

UPDATE 2014/09/04: We have 2 very kind developers contributing to the project: dharmik_bhandari and krutalvm. If anyone is interested in contributing, please do not hesitate to fork it on CodePlex. :)

Hi

This great idea, but why you don't use oData protocol ?
More info you can find: http://www.asp.net/web-api/overview/odata-support-in-aspnet-web-api

nop4you wrote:

Hi, thanks for your suggestion. I did consider Web API before, but the reason I am not using it is documented here. In short, I want to get started quickly, so I want to reuse nopCommerce code as much as possible. There is a possibilities of moving to Web API in the future, but that's when this project is matured enough. For now I want to make sure it can get started and grow quickly. :)

Hi Woon Cherk,

I just checked project and it seems to be great! I also agree with your idea to use existing services, that way it will be lot easier to grow API quickly.

Do you have planned any road map for this plugin? May be we can also help in future!

Regards,
Krunal

jariwalakrunal wrote:

Hi Krunal,

I do not have any road map yet, currently I just want to complete most of the important methods, such as customers and orders CRUD. You are welcomed to propose other methods though! :)

wooncherk wrote:

I think the CRUD operations are good to add to start, but in the hands of the wrong developer, it could be dangerous.  I'd also suggest exposing the public methods of all (or some) the services in Nop.Services.  I recently had to do that to the built-in web service plugin to be able to generate gift cards from another website.  

That way, someone could build a super stripped down version of the site with your plugin and easily remove any extras that they don't need (such as forums, blogs, etc.)

wooncherk wrote:

Hi Wooncherk,

Thanks for your appreciation.

I'm planning to add more methods in next couple of days. I'm also planning to add Product related methods. I know it will be little bit tricky to take care of all functionality provided by the nop. So, we need to take care of all existing functionalities while working on Products related methods.

Thank you.

ron.richardson wrote:

Hi Ron,

1. RE: "I think the CRUD operations are good to add to start, but in the hands of the wrong developer, it could be dangerous."

The moment we decided to open another door for accessing the nopCommerce (through API), we are prepared for one more layer of threat. I've implemented a simple token-based authentication system in the architecture, that should do most of the tricks. But yeah, you never know what the hackers are thinking about, so if you have any insight as of how to improve the security, please contribute to the code!

I am also planning to include an authorization system. So that certain API methods are only allowed for certain API tokens. In that way we can control what the token can do (and cannot do), which minimize the possibilities of security breach. But yeah, that's for future, I would like to get the basics completed first. One step at a time! :)

2. RE: "I'd also suggest exposing the public methods of all (or some) the services in Nop.Services."

That's what most of the contributors are doing. Currently we are focusing on bringing Cutomers and Orders methods into the code. Again, one step at a time! :)

Dharmik wrote:

No problem Dharmik! You (and all the other developers) deserve the credits! :)

It seems like more and more people are joining the projects. I am planning to come out with a simple list of methods to implement, and distribute them among developers. Like this we can make sure no duplicate of code (thus waste of effort) by the contributors!

Again, thanks for the efforts thus far! :)