API development: Lazy tip # 25

TL;DR;

Use cURL and pipe to json_pp “| json_pp “

So for the longest time when working on API’s my process would look like this:

Write code in Visual Studio Code
Change to Postman and click send (try again as Nodemon has not finished restarting)
Check result
Change back to Visual Studio Code
Repeat

But now its

Write code in Visual Studio Code
In the Visual Studio Code terminal press ‘up arrow’ then ‘return’
Check result
Repeat

This has speeded up my development and reduced frustration.

How?
In the terminal I make use of cURL and append the command with | json_pp

For example

curl --location --request POST 'localhost:61100/my-service/report/progress' \
--header 'Authorization: <token> \
--header 'Content-Type: application/json' \
--data-raw '{"ids":["5d765d10a13c116f3ce44d04","62bc1433eb87da610a436a48","62bc7a1147f2e0f3854aa268","62bc2dd747f2e04f724a9e26"]}' | json_pp

Top tip:

Use postman on the first iteration, then use it to export cURL command