RESTX - the lightweight Java REST framework

RESTX is a full lightweight disrupting stack, which includes Swagger-like ui & considers REST specs tests as docs.

It shares similarities with modern frameworks like Play! like hot compile and a very productive experience, but focused on REST and pure Java.

It's licensed under the very commercial friendly Apache License 2, and is actively maintained by a community of developers.

You can get more details from the web site at http://restx.io/

Here you will find the build instructions if you want to build RESTX yourself, and why not contribute to the project.

Build

RESTX requires Java 7.

You can build it using either Maven 2+ or EasyAnt.

With Maven:

mvn install

With EasyAnt:

easyant test package

Changing dependencies

The sources for module descriptors are the md.restx.json files located in each module, and the restx.build.properties for the dependencies version.

Maven poms and EasyAnt Ivy files are generated from these files using restx build generate pom + build generate ivy.

Project organisation

RESTX is decomposed in a set of modules, each one following the traditional Java project layout (main sources in src/main, test sources in src/test).

The main modules are restx-core and restx-factory.

Here is a brief summary of each module:

Main modules:

• restx-common: Some shared utilities, only few ones, relying on Guava we already get a lot of nice utilities from there.
• restx-factory: RESTX Dependency Injection (DI) container. Brought as transitive dependency from restx-core.
• restx-classloader: Hot reload / hot compile support
• restx-apidocs-doclet: Some javadoc doclets used when generating apidocs
• restx-core: Core module, includes the REST framework, base security, JSON support, ...

By relying on restx-core module, every modules described above will be retrieved as transitive dependencies

• restx-core-annotation-processor: Annotation processing to generate routers based on RESTX core annotations. Needed at compile/build time only.

Optional dependencies providing specific features

• restx-i18n: I18n Support
• restx-security-basic: A basic implementation of security, still enough in many cases but you can remove it at will
• restx-core-java8: Java 8 support (like Optional) for restx
• restx-specs-tests: Enables using RESTX specs as JUnit tests.
• restx-specs-tests-java8: Support for java 8 time API during specs tests
• restx-specs-server: Enables using RESTX specs as HTTP mocks (running a server serving spec files responses given spec files requests).
• restx-factory-testing: A module dedicated to test restx-factory features involving annotation processing.
• restx-validation: Bean validation support (based on hibernate-validator implementation) for POJOs BODY parameters
• restx-webjars: Webjars support through urls like /@/webjars/*

MongoDB support through Jongo API:

• restx-jongo: Main MongoDB support through Jongo API.
• restx-jongo-specs-tests: Support of Jongo in your specs (recording and running).

Admin console modules (these are not required modules and are intended only for administration/monitoring) :

• restx-admin: The pluggable RESTX admin web console.
• restx-apidocs: The famous API Docs web console, as a plugin for restx-admin.
• restx-monitor-admin: Poor's man app monitoring web console, plugin for restx-admin.
• restx-factory-admin: RESTX Factory admin console, plugin for restx-admin.
• restx-log-admin: Easy configuration of logback logging from admin console, plugin for restx-admin.
• restx-specs-admin: RESTX Specs recording and running web console, plugin for restx-admin.
• restx-i18n-admin: Easy setting of your i18n translations from the web console, plugin for restx-admin.
• restx-stats-admin: Used to collect stats as explained here

Servers support:

• restx-servlet: Servlet 2.5+ adapter for RESTX, allowing to embed RESTX in any servlet 2.5+ container.
• restx-server-jetty: Embedded Jetty support.
• restx-server-tomcat: Embedded Tomcat support.
• restx-server-simple: SimpleFramework adapter for RESTX, this is the lightest and fastest solution.
• restx-server-testing: JUnit tests for all the supported embedded servers.

restx-server-* are needed only if you want to be able to run restx as a standalone app rather than deploying it If you want to deploy in a web server, you will restx-servlet

Shell modules:

• restx-shell: The pluggable shell.
• restx-shell-manager: Plugin to manage the shell: install plugins, upgrade shell version.
• restx-build: The very simple tool which generates POM / Ivy files from md.restx.json files
• restx-core-shell: Plugin providing RESTX core support in the shell: app comilation and running, ...
• restx-build-shell: Plugin prodividing build support in the shell, especially to generate POM/Ivy files from md.restx.json files.
• restx-specs-shell: Plugin providing RESTX specs based HTTP mock server.
• restx-package: assembly module to package the shell

Metrics:

• restx-monitor-codahale: Codahale metrics for monitor module. Not compatible with Google App Engine.

Others:

• restx-samplest: both a sample of individual features and JUnit tests of them
• restx-samplest-java8: Same as restx-samplest but for demo-ing restx java8 support
• restx-annotation-processors-package: assembly module for annotation processor only, if you prefer to setup annotation processing manually with -proc javac option
• restx-barbarywatch: MacOSX filesystem watching that actually works. Only module with GPL license, but no other module depend on it, it's detected at runtime, and used only during development

Contributing

Contributions are welcome, fork the repo, push your changes to a branch and send a Pull Request.

To be sure the PR will be merged please discuss it on the google group before, or create an issue on GitHub to initiate the discussion.