Is OData a good way to expose non-CRUD APIs?

Question

I'm working on a project that is our companies first foray into Domain Driven Development.

Our Web API originally simply provided CRUD operations and the project exposed OData controllers, but I'm not sure if that is still a good idea.

Is OData a good way to expose non-CRUD APIs?

More info: Initially our web api basically exposed CRUD functions. To create a new User you would simply create one and post it to the service. To change, for example, an address you would get a copy of the user entity, make changes, then perform an update operation. Basic OData stuff.

Beyond providing query support, OData also exposed the service in a readily consumable way, so it could be added to other projects as a service reference and accessed with a proxy.

Since we have moved over to a DDD approach, things have changed significantly. Our Web API is now simply a gateway to a number of independent sub-domain services. We no longer provide CRUD operations or direct access to entities, instead making service calls to manipulate entities. Instead of creating a User entity sending it to the User service via a Put request, a consumer must generate a CreateUserBindingModel and send it to the User/Create service and let the service generate the entity. Changing an address is done through the ChangeAddress(ChangeAddressBindingModel model) method, rather than just updating the whole object. Queries are much more targeted and rarely if ever return entire domain objects.

Is it a bad idea to keep using OData as a basis for our Web API, when we no longer provide CRUD operations? Is there another way to expose the details of our service the way you can with OData? I know WCF services provide similar functionality, but I was under the impression it was even more tied to CRUD than OData.

Answer 1

OData is a data oriented API spec, it's anti-DDD. Although it can satisfy all your requirements to implement REST APIs but it's best for data processing API. I guess you already know that using OData feels like operating the database via HTTP. If you are using DDD you should forget OData totally.