Yes, I know it's confusing because the language has been so thoroughly corrupted over the last decade.
Let me show you my reasoning:
JSON is not a hypertext, even if you include URLs in it. [0]
HATEOAS requires a hypertext (see the first word of the acronym)
HATEOAS is "an essential part of the of the 'uniform interface' feature of REST" [1]
Therefore a JSON API, even with some embedded URLs, using multiple HTTP Methods and following a traditional hierarchical path scheme, is not REST-ful.
[0] - A sufficiently advanced client could interpret a JSON-encoded hypertext in a general, uniform manner. However, in practice, this is almost never the case.
recursivedoubts|5 years ago
Let me show you my reasoning:
JSON is not a hypertext, even if you include URLs in it. [0]
HATEOAS requires a hypertext (see the first word of the acronym)
HATEOAS is "an essential part of the of the 'uniform interface' feature of REST" [1]
Therefore a JSON API, even with some embedded URLs, using multiple HTTP Methods and following a traditional hierarchical path scheme, is not REST-ful.
[0] - A sufficiently advanced client could interpret a JSON-encoded hypertext in a general, uniform manner. However, in practice, this is almost never the case.
[1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HATEOAS