I’m building an app that lets users manage data across multiple tables. I also expose an API so they can fetch their data and process it in external services. I’d like to enhance the API to support filtered queries. Inside the app, I already have a fairly sophisticated system that converts logical conditions objects (a tree with many operators) into SQL queries. I’m now looking for a clean way to:

• express filters in the API request, and
• parse those filters into my internal condition object, which I then turn into SQL.

The challenge: complex queries are hard to pass via GET if I want to remain RESTful. I’m considering two approaches:

1. POST /tables/{table}/records/search with a complex body that defines the filter. This would create a “saved search” in my DB. Clients could then GET /tables/{table}/records/search/{id} to run it, which would first resolve the parameters and then execute the query.

2. Use RSQL for a readable query syntax in the URL. The drawback is that, as far as I understand, RSQL is usually evaluated directly against the DB. In my case I’d still need to parse it and map fields/operators to my internal model so I am not sure that this is a proper solution to my problem.

I’m undecided between these two and not fully convinced by either. Do you have advice or alternative designs?

Also I then would like to be able to reverse the process (serialize my condition object into query params)

I’m building an app that lets users manage data across multiple tables. I also expose an API so they can fetch their data and process it in external services. I’d like to enhance the API to support filtered queries. Inside the app, I already have a fairly sophisticated system that converts logical conditions objects (a tree with many operators) into SQL queries. I’m now looking for a clean way to:

• express filters in the API request, and
• parse those filters into my internal condition object, which I then turn into SQL.

The challenge: complex queries are hard to pass via GET if I want to remain RESTful and I want to use GET in the end to cache my results. I’m considering two approaches:

1. POST /tables/{table}/records/search with a complex body that defines the filter. This would create a “saved search” in my DB. Clients could then GET /tables/{table}/records/search/{id} to run it, which would first resolve the parameters and then execute the query.

2. Use RSQL for a readable query syntax in the URL. The drawback is that, as far as I understand, RSQL is usually evaluated directly against the DB. In my case I’d still need to parse it and map fields/operators to my internal model so I am not sure that this is a proper solution to my problem.

I’m undecided between these two and not fully convinced by either. Do you have advice or alternative designs?

Also I then would like to be able to reverse the process (serialize my condition object into query params)

I’m building an app that lets users manage data across multiple tables. I also expose an API so they can fetch their data and process it in external services. I’d like to enhance the API to support filtered queries. Inside the app, I already have a fairly sophisticated system that converts logical conditions objects (a tree with many operators) into SQL queries. I’m now looking for a clean way to:

express filters in the API request, and parse those filters into my internal condition object, which I then turn into SQL.

The challenge: complex queries are hard to pass via GET if I want to remain RESTful. I’m considering two approaches:

POST /tables/{table}/records/search with a complex body that defines the filter. This would create a “saved search” in my DB. Clients could then GET /tables/{table}/records/search/{id} to run it, which would first resolve the parameters and then execute the query. Use RSQL for a readable query syntax in the URL. The drawback is that, as far as I understand, RSQL is usually evaluated directly against the DB. In my case I’d still need to parse it and map fields/operators to my internal model so I am not sure that this is a proper solution to my problem.

I’m undecided between these two and not fully convinced by either. Do you have advice or alternative designs?

Also I then would like to be able to reverse the process (serialize my condition object into query params)

I’m building an app that lets users manage data across multiple tables. I also expose an API so they can fetch their data and process it in external services. I’d like to enhance the API to support filtered queries. Inside the app, I already have a fairly sophisticated system that converts logical conditions objects (a tree with many operators) into SQL queries. I’m now looking for a clean way to:

• express filters in the API request, and
• parse those filters into my internal condition object, which I then turn into SQL.

The challenge: complex queries are hard to pass via GET if I want to remain RESTful. I’m considering two approaches:

1. POST /tables/{table}/records/search with a complex body that defines the filter. This would create a “saved search” in my DB. Clients could then GET /tables/{table}/records/search/{id} to run it, which would first resolve the parameters and then execute the query.

2. Use RSQL for a readable query syntax in the URL. The drawback is that, as far as I understand, RSQL is usually evaluated directly against the DB. In my case I’d still need to parse it and map fields/operators to my internal model so I am not sure that this is a proper solution to my problem.

I’m undecided between these two and not fully convinced by either. Do you have advice or alternative designs?

Also I then would like to be able to reverse the process (serialize my condition object into query params)