RESTful API Design Questions

Focuses on designing resource oriented web APIs following Representational State Transfer principles and proper use of the Hypertext Transfer Protocol. Core skills include resource modeling and endpoint naming, use of correct Hypertext Transfer Protocol methods and semantics, status code selection and error response structure, idempotency and stateless design, request and response formats such as JavaScript Object Notation, pagination, filtering and sorting strategies, versioning and backward compatibility, authentication and authorization patterns, rate limiting and abuse prevention, caching and performance considerations, API contract testing and documentation, common anti patterns, and designing APIs that balance client usability with backend implementation concerns.

HardSystem Design

70 practiced

Design REST API and data partitioning strategy for a multi-tenant SaaS product where tenants may have different quotas and optional custom fields. Discuss authentication/authorization scopes, per-tenant rate limits and quotas, schema isolation (separate DBs) versus shared schema with tenant_id, and migration strategies for tenants needing dedicated resources.

MediumTechnical

79 practiced

Design a bulk create/update API for users where clients may submit up to 10,000 records in one request. Discuss endpoint design, permissible payload size, partial success handling, transactional guarantees (all-or-nothing vs best-effort), performance implications, and how to report per-item validation errors.

MediumTechnical

57 practiced

As a backend engineer evaluate when to use REST vs GraphQL for new product features. Discuss client needs, caching complexity, versioning, overfetching vs underfetching, security considerations (query complexity), and operational complexity. Provide a decision checklist to choose between them.

HardSystem Design

74 practiced

Design an API pattern to perform multi-resource transactional updates across microservices (e.g., deduct inventory, charge payment, create order). Compare two-phase commit versus saga pattern, describe how you'd model compensating actions, ensure idempotent operations, and surface partial failures to clients.

EasyTechnical

61 practiced

Define idempotency in the context of HTTP APIs and explain why it matters for client retries and reliability. Describe how PUT and DELETE are idempotent while POST is not by default, and outline a simple technique to make a POST create operation idempotent (including storage and expiry considerations).

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