Meme transcription: Panel 1. Two images of JSON, one is the empty object, one is an object in which the key name maps to the value null. Caption: “Corporate needs you to find the difference between this picture and this picture”
Panel 2. The Java backend dev answers, “They’re the same picture.”
I wasn't taking about new fields. I was talking about resource partial updates (eg PATCH, or commonly the U in CRUD).
If you just want to update a single field on a resource with 100 fields, rather than GETting the entire resource, updating the single field, and PUTting whole thing back, just do a PATCH with the single field.
Likewise if you're POSTing a resource that has nullable fields, but the default value isn't null, how do you indicate that you want the default value for a given field? Do you have to first query some metadata API? That doesn't seem ideal, when this existing pattern exists
Those are two very fair points - I agree.