Resterm

Why it's ranked here

Few terminal API clients carry the same definitions from interactive poking to CI without a rewrite, and this one does it three ways: the interface, a headless command that emits text, JSON or JUnit reports, and a public Go package documented as covered by a compatibility promise through v1. Add Apache 2.0 licensing, no account and no telemetry by default, plus reach into private networks through SSH tunnels and Kubernetes port-forwards, and it is a serious pick for teams that want API checks living next to their code.

What's good

The documentation is unusually precise about failure modes. Redirects to another origin strip credential headers and trim the referrer, and a downgrade from HTTPS to HTTP stops credentials for the rest of the chain. The parser refuses ambiguous input: a duplicated single-value directive is an error, and spaces around an equals sign are rejected so a stray setting cannot flip on by accident. Starting is cheap: one init command writes sample requests plus matching mocks, and a pasted curl command or an OpenAPI spec can be converted into request files.

Tradeoffs

A request file is a program, not a document. The security notes say a file can run shell commands for auth, run JavaScript, read files outside the workspace and write files, and none of that is confined to the project. Script blocks stop after 30 seconds, but script memory has no limit. The directive dialect is large and strict, so a file written for another client may parse with warnings or errors. Prebuilt Linux binaries need a reasonably recent glibc.

How to use it well

Suited to backend developers who already keep API calls in version control and want those same calls to gate a CI job. Start with the init command and the local mock, then tag a smoke set and run it in CI with JUnit output. Go teams can call the headless package straight from their tests instead of shelling out. Treat request files from outside your team like scripts and read them first. It is not a hosted collaboration workspace and has no AI features.

Observed

License

Apache License 2.0 (LICENSE)

Language

Go (go.mod)

Interfaces

Terminal UI, CLI subcommands run, mock, record, init, collection and history, and the public Go headless package (cmd/resterm/main.go, docs/headless.md)

Protocols

HTTP, GraphQL, gRPC, WebSocket and SSE (README.md)

Report formats

Text, JSON and JUnit (docs/headless.md)

Install surface

Homebrew, shell and PowerShell install scripts, go install, prebuilt binaries for macOS, Linux and Windows (README.md)

Import sources

curl commands and OpenAPI specifications converted to request files (cmd/resterm/main.go)

Execution scope

Request files can run commands and JavaScript and read or write files outside the workspace (docs/security.md)

Account and telemetry

No account and no telemetry by default; OTLP tracing only when a request opts in (README.md, docs/security.md)