Understanding one step below the abstraction level where you operate is extremely useful. For most programmers who spend a lot of their time developing REST APIs, this level would be HTTP. What better way to learn about how the HyperText Transfer Protocol works than to build a server on top of TCP?

1. TCP Logger - Listen for TCP connections and log what is received
2. TCP Two-Way Communication - Create a protocol for talking back-in-forth over TCP
3. Minimal HTTP Server - The bare bones of responding to a HTTP request
4. HTTP Server Outline - Scaffolding out our own HTTP package
5. HTTP Server Implementation - A "working" HTTP server