What is an Endpoint?

Question

I have been reading about OAuth and it keeps talking about endpoints. What is exactly an endpoint?

Answer 1

Short answer: "an endpoint is an abstraction that models the end of a message channel through which a system can send or receive messages" (Ibsen, 2010).

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Endpoint vs URI (disambiguation)

The endpoint is not the same as a URI. One reason is because a URI can drive to different endpoints like an endpoint to GET, another to POST, and so on. Example:

@GET /api/agents/{agent_id} //Returns data from the agent identified by *agent_id*
@PUT /api/agents/{agent_id} //Update data of the agent identified by *agent_id*

Endpoint vs resource (disambiguation)

The endpoint is not the same as a resource. One reason is because different endpoints can drive to the same resource. Example:

@GET /api/agents/{agent_id} @Produces("application/xml") //Returns data in XML format
@GET /api/agents/{agent_id} @Produces("application/json") //Returns data in JSON format