Is an entity body allowed for an HTTP DELETE request?

Question

When issuing an HTTP DELETE request, the request URI should completely identify the resource to delete. However, is it allowable to add extra meta-data as part of the entity

Answer 1

Using DELETE with a Body is risky... I prefer this approach for List Operations over REST:

Regular Operations

GET /objects/ Gets all Objects

GET /object/ID Gets an Object with specified ID

POST /objects Adds a new Object

PUT /object/ID Adds an Object with specified ID, Updates an Object

DELETE /object/ID Deletes the object with specified ID

All Custom actions are POST

POST /objects/addList Adds a List or Array of Objects included in body

POST /objects/deleteList Deletes a List of Objects included in body

POST /objects/customQuery Creates a List based on custom query in body

If a client doesn't support your extended operations they can work in the regular way.