RESTful API Design and HTTP Fundamentals Questions
Understanding REST architectural principles including resource-based URLs, proper HTTP methods (GET for safe retrieval, POST for creation, PUT for updates, DELETE for deletion), appropriate status codes (200 OK, 201 Created, 400 Bad Request, 404 Not Found, 500 Internal Server Error), and stateless communication patterns. Ability to design simple API endpoints following REST conventions.
MediumTechnical
73 practiced
As the SRE for a public REST API, propose caching strategies across CDN, API gateway, and service layer for endpoints returning public and user-specific data. Explain cache-key design, Cache-Control headers, invalidation strategies, and how to measure cache effectiveness (metrics to collect).
MediumTechnical
76 practiced
Compare three API versioning strategies for a REST API: URI versioning (/v1/resource), header-based versioning (Accept: application/vnd.company.v1+json), and query-parameter versioning (?version=1). For each approach, discuss operational impacts on routing, caching, logging, and how SREs would monitor and support gradual rollouts.
HardSystem Design
81 practiced
You're migrating a REST API that changes entity semantics (field renames, different payload structure) used by many clients. Design a zero-downtime migration plan that includes backward-compatible API design, translation/facade layers, dual-write or data migration strategies, testing, canary rollout, and rollback plans from an SRE perspective.
HardSystem Design
85 practiced
Describe how to implement circuit breakers for downstream dependencies used by REST APIs at both the gateway and service level. Explain what metrics should trigger state transitions (open/half-open/close), where breaker state should be stored, how to avoid cascading failures, and how SREs should test and tune the breaker behavior.
HardTechnical
64 practiced
Design an SRE-focused test suite to validate that REST APIs emit correct telemetry: structured logs (schema), traces (span names/ids), and metrics (labels/units), and that they return appropriate HTTP status codes. Include mock dependencies, failure injection (chaos), and how CI/CD should enforce telemetry schema compliance and fail builds for critical telemetry regressions.
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