HTTP Response Status Codes: GET (retrieve), POST (create), PUT (modify), and DELETE (REST, Bulk, Any API)

Question

Many of us, who are starters, starting to wonder when reading any API documentations or starting out with your first program built to make any of the API calls, what do all error codes means, when I get many different types of response from running the program/script. The only reason I thought about sharing this is because I know how motivation plays a key role when dealing with Eloqua platform and building components on top. This extends the functionality beyond what is already out of the box.
I put together a table that explains these in details. I hope you can benefit in resolving issues as you venture in your journeys. This is a very common chart that can be seen across many platform REST APIs. Idea was to have it here because the audience are not always the same.
Response Code
HTTP Operation
Response Body Contents
Description
200
GET, PUT, DELETE
Resource
No error, operation successful.
201 Created
POST
Resource that was created
Successful creation of a resource.
202 Accepted
POST, PUT, DELETE
N/A
The request was received.
204 No Content
GET, PUT, DELETE
N/A
The request was processed successfully, but no response body is needed.
301 Moved Permanently
GET
XHTML with link
Resource has moved.
303 See Other
GET
XHTML with link
Redirection.
304 Not Modified
conditional GET
N/A
Resource has not been modified.
400 Bad Request
GET, POST, PUT, DELETE
Error Message
Malformed syntax or a bad query.
401 Unauthorized
GET, POST, PUT, DELETE
Error Message
Action requires user authentication.
403 Forbidden
GET, POST, PUT, DELETE
Error Message
Authentication failure or invalid Application ID.
404 Not Found
GET, POST, PUT, DELETE
Error Message
Resource not found.
405 Not Allowed
GET, POST, PUT, DELETE
Error Message
Method not allowed on resource.
406 Not Acceptable
GET
Error Message
Requested representation not available for the resource.
408 Request Timeout
GET, POST
Error Message
Request has timed out.
409 Resource Conflict
PUT, PUT, DELETE
Error Message
State of the resource doesn't permit request.
410 Gone
GET, PUT
Error Message
The URI used to refer to a resource.
411 Length Required
POST, PUT
Error Message
The server needs to know the size of the entity body and it should be specified in the Content Length header.
412 Precondition failed
GET
Error Message
Operation not completed because preconditions were not met.
413 Request Entity Too Large
POST, PUT
Error Message
The representation was too large for the server to handle.
414 Request URI too long
POST, PUT
Error Message
The URI has more than 2k characters.
415 Unsupported Type
POST, PUT
Error Message
Representation not supported for the resource.
416 Requested Range Not Satisfiable
GET
Error Message
Requested range not satisfiable.
500 Server Error
GET, POST, PUT
Error Message
Internal server error.
501 Not Implemented
POST, PUT, DELETE
Error Message
Requested HTTP operation not supported.
502 Bad Gateway
GET, POST, PUT, DELETE
Error Message
Backend service failure (data store failure).
505
GET
Error Message
HTTP version not supported.
Hope this helps. Original post: REST API Status Codes and Complete REST API Tutorial with Status Codes.
Thank
Amit

Answer 1

Hi, I am trying to PUT to update contact info and I get following error:
2015-01-16 11:00:17,970 INFO [main] oracle.eloqua.connector.eloqua.EloquaConnector.putWithBasicAuth(97) | accessHttpsPut.url=https://secure.eloqua.com/API/REST/2.0//data/contact/7606838, text={"id":"7606838","accountName":"openIdStr001","emailAddress":"[email protected]","type":"Contact"}
2015-01-16 11:00:18,931 ERROR [main] oracle.eloqua.connector.eloqua.EloquaConnector.putWithBasicAuth(140) | ClientProtocolException
org.apache.http.client.HttpResponseException: Request is malformed.
Is there any idea?
Thanks so much.
Sincerely.