Data sent and received from the Author-it API is either simple data, or data represented by a data transfer object (DTO).
Simple Data: Numbers (1,2,3...), Boolean (true, false), Strings ("Joe Bloggs") etc.
Complex Data: Author-it Topic Object, Author-it Folder.
The DTO objects don't contain any methods. The services perform all operations. The reason for this departure is so the API will function the same when used as a web service (via SOAP or JSON), or referenced directly as a .NET assembly. Data sent from the API is serializable to all the formats provided as endpoints by the Apache Server Application Programming Interface.