ruby - Connecting to web services using Rails (HTTP requests)? -

i using ruby on rails 3 , trying implement apis retrieve account information web service. is, connect web service has account class , information show action routed @ uri http://<site_name>/accounts/1.

at time, in web service accounts_controller.rb file have:

class accountscontroller < applicationcontroller   def show     @account = account.find(params[:id])      respond_to |format|       format.html       format.js       format.json { render :json => @account.to_json }     end   end end 

now need advice connecting web service. in client application, should have http request, here question: "the best" approach connect web service making http requests?

this code in client application works:

url = uri.parse('http://<site_name>/accounts/1.json') req = net::http::get.new(url.path) res = net::http.start(url.host, url.port) {|http|   http.request(req) }  @output = json(res.body)["account"] 

but, above code "the way" implement apis?

is advisable use third-party plugins , gems?

yes, since you're using restful routes, basic api. you're returning structured json data consumable application.

there other ways implement web services api (e.g. soap), , proper way.

since it's web services api, connecting correct url , parsing response way go on client side. though if need access many different resources might idea create flexible way of building request url.