7.3 Service Identification
RESTful Web services leverage the URI standard as the naming
mechanism to address resources. The advantage of URIs is
that they encapsulate all information required to identify and locate
a resource on a global addressing space without the need for
a centralized registry. Furthermore, URIs can be bookmarked, exchanged
via hyperlinks and, given their readability, even printed on
billboards for advertising [26].
WS-* initially lacked a standard addressing mechanism and also
relied on URIs for identification of messaging end-points and WSDL
service interface descriptions. More recently, WS-Addressing [44]
was introduced to represent addressing information through the
definition of “end-point references”. This standard language augments the information stored in URIs with additional metadata, but
lacks the conciseness and readability properties that ensured the
success of URIs.