diff --git a/library/Director/Web/Controller/Extension/RestApi.php b/library/Director/Web/Controller/Extension/RestApi.php
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..89e75d6f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/library/Director/Web/Controller/Extension/RestApi.php
@@ -0,0 +1,71 @@
+<?php
+
+namespace Icinga\Module\Director\Web\Controller\Extension;
+
+use Icinga\Exception\AuthenticationException;
+use Icinga\Exception\NotFoundError;
+use Icinga\Module\Director\Controllers\ServicetemplatesController;
+use Icinga\Web\Response;
+
+trait RestApi
+{
+    protected function isApified()
+    {
+        if (property_exists($this, 'isApified')) {
+            return $this->isApified;
+        } else {
+            return false;
+        }
+    }
+
+    protected function checkForRestApiRequest()
+    {
+        if ($this->getRequest()->isApiRequest()) {
+            if (! $this->hasPermission('director/api')) {
+                throw new AuthenticationException('You are not allowed to access this API');
+            }
+
+            if (! $this->isApified()) {
+                throw new NotFoundError('No such API endpoint found');
+            }
+        }
+    }
+
+    protected function sendJson(Response $response, $object)
+    {
+        $response->setHeader('Content-Type', 'application/json', true);
+        $this->_helper->layout()->disableLayout();
+        $this->_helper->viewRenderer->setNoRender(true);
+        /** @var ServicetemplatesController $this */
+        $this->viewRenderer->disable();
+        echo json_encode($object, JSON_PRETTY_PRINT) . "\n";
+    }
+
+    protected function sendJsonError(Response $response, $message, $code = null)
+    {
+        if ($code !== null) {
+            $response->setHttpResponseCode((int) $code);
+        }
+
+        $this->sendJson($response, (object) ['error' => $message]);
+    }
+
+    // TODO: just return json_last_error_msg() for PHP >= 5.5.0
+    protected function getLastJsonError()
+    {
+        switch (json_last_error()) {
+            case JSON_ERROR_DEPTH:
+                return 'The maximum stack depth has been exceeded';
+            case JSON_ERROR_CTRL_CHAR:
+                return 'Control character error, possibly incorrectly encoded';
+            case JSON_ERROR_STATE_MISMATCH:
+                return 'Invalid or malformed JSON';
+            case JSON_ERROR_SYNTAX:
+                return 'Syntax error';
+            case JSON_ERROR_UTF8:
+                return 'Malformed UTF-8 characters, possibly incorrectly encoded';
+            default:
+                return 'An error occured when parsing a JSON string';
+        }
+    }
+}