Representational state transfer
The project and database Open Domesday - by Anna Powell-Smith and
the CCT Clamping websites use the RESTfull API (Anytime API)
At the present time I am not sure how this really helps in the development of a website or the maintenance of a database.
I have used "State Machine" architecture in the past and while this was perhaps useful at the time it was not easy to debug and
maintain. The description below from Wikipedia seems to be ovrly general and really states that designs should be "good".
What Wikipedia says about REST:
Representational state transfer (REST) is a software architectural style that was created to guide the design and development
of the architecture for the World Wide Web. REST defines a set of constraints for how the architecture of an Internet-scale
distributed hypermedia system, such as the Web, should behave. The REST architectural style emphasises the scalability of
interactions between components, uniform interfaces, independent deployment of components, and the creation of a layered
architecture to facilitate caching of components to reduce user-perceived latency, enforce security, and encapsulate legacy systems.