Basics

An endpoint is represented as a value of type Endpoint[A, I, E, O, R], where:

  • A is the type of security input parameters

  • I is the type of input parameters

  • E is the type of error-output parameters

  • O is the type of output parameters

  • R are the capabilities that are required by this endpoint’s inputs/outputs, such as support for websockets or a particular non-blocking streaming implementation. Any, if there are no such requirements.

Input/output parameters (A, I, E and O) can be:

  • of type Unit, when there’s no input/output

  • a single type

  • a tuple of types

Hence, an empty, initial endpoint, with no inputs and no outputs, from which all other endpoints are derived has the type:

import sttp.tapir._

val endpoint: Endpoint[Unit, Unit, Unit, Unit, Any] = ???

For endpoints which have no security inputs, a type alias is provided which fixes A to Unit:

import sttp.tapir._

type PublicEndpoint[I, E, O, -R] = Endpoint[Unit, I, E, O, R]

A public endpoint has two inputs of types UUID and Int, upon error returns a String, and on normal completion returns a User, would have the type:

import sttp.tapir._

val userEndpoint: PublicEndpoint[(UUID, Int), String, User, Any] = ???

You can think of an endpoint as a function, which takes input parameters of type A & I and returns a result of type Either[E, O].

Infallible endpoints

Note that the empty endpoint description maps no values to either error and success outputs, however errors are still represented and allowed to occur. In case of the error output, the single member of the unit type, (): Unit, maps to an empty-body 400 Bad Request.

If you prefer to use an endpoint description, where errors cannot happen, use infallibleEndpoint: PublicEndpoint[Unit, Nothing, Unit, Any]. This might be useful when interpreting endpoints as a client.

Defining an endpoint

The description of an endpoint is an immutable case class, which includes a number of methods:

  • the name, description, etc. methods allow modifying the endpoint information, which will then be included in the endpoint documentation

  • the get, post etc. methods specify the HTTP method which the endpoint should support

  • the securityIn, in, errorOut and out methods allow adding a new input/output parameter

  • mapIn, mapInTo, … methods allow mapping the current input/output parameters to another value or to a case class

An important note on mapping: in tapir, all mappings are bi-directional. That’s because each mapping can be used to generate a server or a client, as well as in many cases can be used both for input and for output.

Next

Read on about describing endpoint inputs/outputs.