title: Can REST clients be not RESTful?
body: <p>REST is defined by its principle of uniform interface.  Resources are accessed and modified by manipulating their representations.  The uniform interface also implies Hypermedia as the engine of application state (HATEOAS) which is explained by Wikipedia:</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>Clients make state transitions only through actions that are dynamically identified within hypermedia by the server (e.g., by hyperlinks within hypertext). Except for simple fixed entry points to the application, a client does not assume that any particular action is available for any particular resources beyond those described in representations previously received from the server.</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>Essentially a REST client receives from the server links that it can use to create, modify, or delete resources similar to how a human chooses links on a Web page.</p>
  
  <p>I often see examples in tutorials or documentation of how to access a REST API with jQuery that look like this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>jQuery.getJSON("/cities/mumbai/events/?month=2009-05", function(json) {
      alert(json[0]);
  });
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>In this case the client is not using HATEOAS or other connected aspects of REST.  Does this mean that we can say that this client is not RESTful?</p>