Insomnia REST Client vs RAML

Overview

RAML

Stacks147

Followers156

Votes39

Insomnia REST Client

Stacks800

Followers652

Votes44

Insomnia REST Client vs RAML: What are the differences?

Insomnia REST Client and RAML are two tools that are used in the field of software development to facilitate and streamline the process of designing and testing RESTful APIs. While both tools serve similar purposes, they have some key differences that set them apart.

Design vs Testing: The main difference between Insomnia REST Client and RAML lies in their primary focus. Insomnia is primarily designed for testing and debugging APIs, providing a user-friendly interface for sending requests and viewing responses. On the other hand, RAML focuses on API design, providing a specification format for documenting and describing APIs.
Interface: Insomnia REST Client offers a sleek and intuitive user interface with various features to aid in testing APIs, such as request history, code snippet generation, and advanced authentication options. RAML, being a specification format, does not have a dedicated user interface but can be used with other tools for designing and documenting APIs.
Dynamic vs Static: Insomnia REST Client allows users to send requests and receive responses in real-time, making it suitable for dynamic testing and debugging. RAML, being a static specification format, is used in the early stages of API design and can be used to generate documentation and client SDKs.
Flexibility: Insomnia REST Client provides great flexibility in terms of sending different types of requests like GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, etc., along with support for various authentication methods and plugins for extending functionality. RAML, being a specification format, focuses more on documenting the API structure, data types, and resource models, offering a structured approach to API design.
Collaboration: Insomnia REST Client allows for easy collaboration with team members by providing features like import/export workspaces, syncing across devices, and team libraries. RAML also supports collaboration to some extent by allowing multiple developers to work on the same API design, but the extent of collaboration may depend on the tooling used in conjunction with RAML.
Wider Ecosystem: Insomnia REST Client has built a wider ecosystem around it, with active community support, plugins, and integrations with other tools like Git, Kubernetes, etc. RAML, being a specification format, can be used with a range of tools and frameworks that support the RAML specification.

In Summary, Insomnia REST Client is primarily focused on testing, provides a user-friendly interface, and offers flexibility and collaboration features, while RAML is focused on API design, offers a structured approach, and can be used with various tools and frameworks supporting the RAML specification.

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CLI (Node.js)

Manual

Advice on RAML, Insomnia REST Client

Stephen

Artificial Intelligence Fellow

Feb 4, 2020

Decided

Postman supports automation and organization in a way that Insomnia just doesn't. Admittedly, Insomnia makes it slightly easy to query the data that you get back (in a very MongoDB-esque query language) but Postman sets you up to develop the code that you would use in development/testing right in the editor.

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Comments

Detailed Comparison

RAML	Insomnia REST Client
RESTful API Modeling Language (RAML) makes it easy to manage the whole API lifecycle from design to sharing. It's concise - you only write what you need to define - and reusable. It is machine readable API design that is actually human friendly.	Insomnia is a powerful REST API Client with cookie management, environment variables, code generation, and authentication for Mac, Window, and Linux.
Create and pull in namespaced, reusable libraries, containing data types; Annotations let you add vendor specific functionality without compromising your spec; Traits and resource Types let you take advantage of code reuse and design patterns; Easily define resources and methods then add as much detail as you want	Mac, Windows and Linux;Data import/export;SSL client certificates;Response history;JSONPath and XPath;Preview rendered HTML;Multipart form;Query parameter editor;Configurable proxy;Cloud sync and sharing;Nunjucks templating;Filter requests;Toggle SSL validation;Keyboard shortcuts;Configurable timeout;HAR import;Usable at almost all sizes;Drag-n-drop organization;Responsive interface;Import from curl;
Statistics
Stacks 147	Stacks 800
Followers 156	Followers 652
Votes 39	Votes 44
Pros & Cons
Pros 15 API Specification 7 Human Readable 6 API Documentation 3 Design Patterns & Code Reuse 2 Automatic Generation of Mule flow	Pros 16 Easy to work with 11 Great user interface 6 Works with GraphQL 4 Cross platform, available for Mac, Windows, and Linux 3 Opensource Cons 4 Do not have team sharing options 2 Do not store credentials in HTTP

What are some alternatives to RAML, Insomnia REST Client?

Postman

It is the only complete API development environment, used by nearly five million developers and more than 100,000 companies worldwide.

Paw

Paw is a full-featured and beautifully designed Mac app that makes interaction with REST services delightful. Either you are an API maker or consumer, Paw helps you build HTTP requests, inspect the server's response and even generate client code.

Karate DSL

Combines API test-automation, mocks and performance-testing into a single, unified framework. The BDD syntax popularized by Cucumber is language-neutral, and easy for even non-programmers. Besides powerful JSON & XML assertions, you can run tests in parallel for speed - which is critical for HTTP API testing.

Appwrite

Appwrite's open-source platform lets you add Auth, DBs, Functions and Storage to your product and build any application at any scale, own your data, and use your preferred coding languages and tools.

Runscope

Keep tabs on all aspects of your API's performance with uptime monitoring, integration testing, logging and real-time monitoring.

Apigee

API management, design, analytics, and security are at the heart of modern digital architecture. The Apigee intelligent API platform is a complete solution for moving business to the digital world.

Hoppscotch

It is a free, fast and beautiful API request builder. It helps you create requests faster, saving precious time on development

Falcor

Falcor lets you represent all your remote data sources as a single domain model via a virtual JSON graph. You code the same way no matter where the data is, whether in memory on the client or over the network on the server.

DuckRails

DuckRails is an open source development tool that helps developer mock API endpoints quickly & dynamically outside the application code.

OpenAPI Specification

It defines a standard, language-agnostic interface to RESTful APIs which allows both humans and computers to discover and understand the capabilities of the service without access to source code, documentation, or through network traffic inspection.

Related Comparisons

Insomnia REST Client vs RAML: What are the differences?

Design vs Testing: The main difference between Insomnia REST Client and RAML lies in their primary focus. Insomnia is primarily designed for testing and debugging APIs, providing a user-friendly interface for sending requests and viewing responses. On the other hand, RAML focuses on API design, providing a specification format for documenting and describing APIs.
Interface: Insomnia REST Client offers a sleek and intuitive user interface with various features to aid in testing APIs, such as request history, code snippet generation, and advanced authentication options. RAML, being a specification format, does not have a dedicated user interface but can be used with other tools for designing and documenting APIs.
Dynamic vs Static: Insomnia REST Client allows users to send requests and receive responses in real-time, making it suitable for dynamic testing and debugging. RAML, being a static specification format, is used in the early stages of API design and can be used to generate documentation and client SDKs.
Flexibility: Insomnia REST Client provides great flexibility in terms of sending different types of requests like GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, etc., along with support for various authentication methods and plugins for extending functionality. RAML, being a specification format, focuses more on documenting the API structure, data types, and resource models, offering a structured approach to API design.
Collaboration: Insomnia REST Client allows for easy collaboration with team members by providing features like import/export workspaces, syncing across devices, and team libraries. RAML also supports collaboration to some extent by allowing multiple developers to work on the same API design, but the extent of collaboration may depend on the tooling used in conjunction with RAML.
Wider Ecosystem: Insomnia REST Client has built a wider ecosystem around it, with active community support, plugins, and integrations with other tools like Git, Kubernetes, etc. RAML, being a specification format, can be used with a range of tools and frameworks that support the RAML specification.

Insomnia REST Client vs RAML

Overview