I am new to RESTful architecture or at least new to using it properly I have only had true experience with SOAP. I am having a problem wrapping my head around some things. I know there are other questions that are similar but none, that I have found, answer my question satisfactorily.
I am just starting this app so I want to get it started the right way and what I am looking at now is a user registration screen. I have two validation calls that occur before the registration form is even submitted. First I have a validation call that checks to make sure the email entered by the user is unique and second I have a validation call that checks to make sure an access code we provide to the customer exists in the database.
I currently have it structured as a POST(which I believe should be a GET) and I have an action argument that defines what I am wanting to do. So for the email I have an argument string such as
action=validateemail&[email protected]
and it is calling the User action of my MembershipController. I am entirely sure this is wrong as I should only be using the verbs GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE yet I am defining my own verb using the action argument.
Honestly, I don't know how to do this. I believe the User should be my resource but possibly for the email validation Email should be my resource. I guess what I am asking is how would you do what I am trying to do? I know some of you might just say do all the validation upon the submit, but I would prefer to do it both ways really. I would like the asynchronous validation as well as the validation I will perform when the user submits.
Any help would be greatly appreciated!