API, REST, SOAP, XML-RPC, WTF?!?!

[eluser]jedd[/eluser]
Hey slowgary, not sure if I can add any clarity to the conversation, but at the very least you can feel better knowing that someone else is sharing your cluelessness.

As I understand it - and I am by a long way no expert in this field - SOAP is almost deprecated, at least in the realms we're likely to move in, by its sheer complexity and weight.

XML bundling of data - or JSON if you prefer something ostensibly simpler - is a good way, by my understanding of both it and the description you have provided for what you are aiming to achieve - and is probably your best way forward.

REST is a way of communicating where the entire state of the current transaction is transferred through a URL (or equivalent). Most REST implementations I've seen have usually been half-arsed (intentionally or otherwise - Facebook is a prime example of the first type). I can see the engineering elegance that REST is aiming to achieve, but ultimately I can't see the point (and before anyone pops in with a '-' isn't a hexadecimal digit style counter - I can see the point that is usually proferred as an explanation, but there are other, simpler technologies that can achieve the same result).