How should a REST URL schema look like for a tree hierarchy?

Question

Let\'s assume that I have stores, shelves in a store, and products on a shelf. So in order to get a list of products on a shelf in a store, I\'d use the following request:

Answer 1

Since products may be in several stores or several shelves (categories?), I'd have each product have a unique number regardless of its position in the hierarchy. Then use the flat product number. That makes the API more stable when some products are for instance moved in your store.

In short, don't add unneeded redundancy to your API. To get a shelve list a store ID is enough, for a product list a shelve ID is enough... etc.