&gt; This sounds like incompetent back-end design in the initial REST API.<p>It doesn&#x27;t even qualify as REST.  They&#x27;ve got hard-coded URI hierarchies and IDs everywhere.  That&#x27;s the <i>opposite</i> of REST.<p>REST APIs must be hypertext-driven: <a href="http:&#x2F;&#x2F;roy.gbiv.com&#x2F;untangled&#x2F;2008&#x2F;rest-apis-must-be-hypertext-driven" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;roy.gbiv.com&#x2F;untangled&#x2F;2008&#x2F;rest-apis-must-be-hyperte...</a>