Using Wiremock for quick and easy http mocks of your API

I published this article at the turn of the year in my company's internal blog. I am republishing it here thinking it might be useful to outside world who are looking at a concise guide.

WireMock is an HTTP mock server. At its core it is web server that can be primed to

1. serve canned responses to particular requests (stubbing) and 
2. that captures incoming requests so that they can be checked later (verification).

Imagine your application component is dependent on some other component for development or testing, here WireMock can come in and remove your dependency headaches.
You can agree the contract, design the stub and use it for your own component without tight integration with other component. This makes the development and testing much
easier and faster.