How can I deal with HTTP GET query string length limitations and still want to be RESTful?

Question

As stated in http://www.boutell.com/newfaq/misc/urllength.html, HTTP query string have limited length. It can be limited by the client (Firefox, IE, ...), the server (Apache

Answer 1

Based on your description, IMHO you should use a POST. POST is for putting data on the server and, in some cases, obtain an answer. In your case, you do a search (send a query to the server) and get the result of that search (retrieve the query result).

The definition of GET says that it must be used to retrieve an already existing resource. By definition, POST is to create a new resource. This is exactly what you are doing: creating a resource on the server and retrieving it! Even if you don't store the search result, you created an object on the server and retrieved it. As PeterMmm previsouly said, you could do this with a POST (create and store the query result) and then use a GET to retrive the query, but it's more pratical do only a POST and retrieve the result.

Hope this helps! :)