The HTTP PUT method is used for updating or creating the resource pointed by the URI. The @javax.ws.rs.PUT annotation designates the method of a resource class to respond to the HTTP PUT requests. The PUT request generally has a message body carrying the payload. The value of the payload could be any valid internet media type, such as the JSON object, XML structure, plain text, HTML content, or binary stream. When a request reaches a server, the framework intercepts the request and directs it to the appropriate method that matches the URI path and the HTTP method type. The request payload will be mapped to the method parameter as appropriate by the framework.

The following code snippet shows how you can use the @PUT annotation to designate the editDepartment() method to respond to the HTTP PUT request. The payload present in the message body will be converted and copied to the department parameter by the framework:

@PUT 
@Path("{id}") 
@Consumes(MediaType.APPLICATION_JSON) 
public void editDepartment(@PathParam("id") Short id,  
  Department department) { 
  //Updates department entity to data store 
  updateDepartmentEntity(id, department); 
}