[danbruc]

[...] and REST is nothing to do with data formats.

In theory yes, but in practice almost no one builds anything that comes close to the initial vision of REST, in practice, i.e. the way the term is commonly used, REST means little more than we push around JSON via HTTP and maybe the HTTP method indicates what operation I want to do. And REST I mentioned with Swagger in comparison to SOAP and WSDL, not to JSON or XML.

[_a_a_a_]

Perhaps you could explain what that means, given REST is defined fairly well in Fielding's dissertation, and fits in quite well with pushing data around with the HTTP method indicating the operation. Wat else?

[danbruc]

HATEOAS [1], i.e. you discover the available operations dynamically. In my opinion totally impractical unless the service is directly consumed by humans or you are building some kind of naked objects application [2] with all its implications. But this is what really distinguished REST from other remote procedure call implementations and this is also what essentially nobody does.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HATEOAS

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naked_objects