Exploring OData services using HTTP/REST tools

Instead of a browser, a better tool for exploring your OData service is the VS Code extension named REST Client or the HTTP editor built into Visual Studio.

Creating an HTTP file for making requests

Let’s explore the many types of queries that your OData web service can automatically handle by creating an .http file:

1. In your preferred code editor, start the Northwind.OData project web service and leave it running.
2. In the HttpRequests folder, create a file named odata-catalog.http and modify its contents to contain some basic requests to the catalog model, as shown in the following code:

   ### Configure a variable for the web service base address.
   @base_address = https://localhost:5121/catalog/
   ### Make a GET request to the base address.
   GET {{base_address}}
   ### Make a GET request to the base address for metadata.
   GET {{base_address}}$metadata
   ### Make a GET request to get all categories.
   GET {{base_address...