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Can someone help explain this example API call

So long story short, I am creating a java application for android and i need to access the USDA's "food data central" api. It is a REST api and I am using Retrofit to make my calls to the API. I am trying to figure out their example call to their API in the documentation but I am very new to this API stuff so I am a little lost.
They have this listed as their "Example Call"
curl -H "Content-Type:application/json"
-X POST
-d '{"generalSearchInput":"Cheddar cheese"}'
https://DEMO_KEY#api.nal.usda.gov/fdc/v1/search
I know the -X means it is a post command to the API and I believe the -d contains the request parameters but I am completely lost as to what the first line means. Also do you think the last line is the header? or the header and the endpoint. Thank you so much for looking.
Here is the link to the documentation page

What you have there is a http call being made by a tool called curl. It's just a way to make http requests via the command line. The last line is the endpoint.
Here are a few resources to get you started with curl:
The doc page for curl: https://curl.haxx.se/docs/manpage.html
Curl explained in video format: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7XUibDYw4mc

The first line sets the header Content-Type to the value application/json.
POST is the http method.
{"generalSearchInput":"Cheddar cheese"} is the body of the request
The last line is the URL containing a placeholder for the API key.
A raw request would look like
POST /fdc/v1/search HTTP/1.1
Authorization: Basic REVNT19LRVk6
User-Agent: curl/7.29.0
Host: localhost
Accept: */*
Content-Type:application/json
Content-Length: 39
{"generalSearchInput":"Cheddar cheese"}

Rest client framework for complex objects

I have developed one web service for order management. This web service takes many complex objects as input parameters. I used curl to test and it works fine. Now I am writing a client but having issue when for ArrayList (e.g. the items are coming as ArrayList) objects. It's sending as String. It's seems the limitation the client framework I am using. I have tried one or two open frameworks but they are not working as expected. It will be great if you can suggest some framework with some examples.
Below is the sample curl request, I have removed some extra parameters to keep it simple.
curl -L -v -b agent_cookies.txt -H "Content-Type: application/json" -d
"{"items":{"atg-rest-class-type":"java.util.ArrayList","atg-rest-values":
[{"atg-rest-class-type":"com.bean.CommerceItemInfo","tinSkuNumber":"41589367","itemNumber":
280594,"color": 9,"size":
94,"salePrice":50.00,"taxAmount":3.5,"stateTax":0.48,"countyTax":0.08,"currencyCode":"USD"},{"atg-rest-class-type":"com..bean.CommerceItemInfo",
"tinSkuNumber":"41589375","itemNumber": 280594,"color": 9,"size":
96,"salePrice":100.00,"taxAmount":7,"stateTax":0.96,"countyTax":0.16,"currencyCode":"USD"}]},orderInfo:{...},"clientAddress":{"atg-rest-class-type":"java.util.ArrayList","atg-rest-values":
[{"atg-rest-class-type":"com.bean.ClientAddress",\"firstName\":\"John\",\"lastName\":\"Dao\",\"state\":\"FL\",\"country\":\"US\",\"postalCode\":\"33606\",\"address1\":\"100
S Edison Avenue\",\"address2\":\"Suite
D\",\"city\":\"Tampa\",\"addressType\":\"BOTH\"}]},{......}}"
http://localhost:8080/rest/model/com/web/actor/CartActor/testOrder
Thank you

After some research I found the limitation of ATG client and no way we can send List.I changed the arguments to accept individual beans only.

403 Response from Power BI Rest API

I am getting a 403 response from the Power BI rest API and I am not sure why.
Here is the request I am making in cURL format(my actual web app is in Java):
curl -X GET -H "Authorization: Bearer accessToken" -H "Cache-Control: no-cache" 'https://api.powerbi.com/beta/myorg/dashboards'
I have given all Power BI Service permissions on my app in the azure management portal.
Do I need to replace 'myorg' with an actual org name? If so where would I find my org name? What am I doing wrong? This request seems to work for me in Aipary.io so I think it has something to do with my app not the request.
I have tried this request with both an admin account and a regular user and I get 403 responses for both of them.
I have also tried removing the Power BI Service permissions from the app with my admin account and then adding them again. That didn't work.

It seems to be that the 403 response was caused by the request in cURL missing some required parameters. The 403 response should show the error information that might be ignore.
Per my experience, I recommand you can try to use the GUI tool Postman in Chrome for requesting the APIs like cURL.
For checking the issue, you can follow the toturial https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/powerbi-developer-authenticate-a-web-app/ to make sure the request required parameters correct.
However, according to your description for the issue, I can't locate the problem whether the prepare steps cause. So I suggest you can try to review the complete toturial https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/powerbi-developer-steps-to-create-a-power-bi-app/ to be sure the every step is correct.
Hope it helps. Any concern, please feel free to let me know.

cURL commands in java

How to use the cURl command
curl https://na1.salesforce.com/services/data/v20.0/query?q=SELECT+name+from+Account
-H "Authorization: Bearer access_token" -H "X-PrettyPrint:1"
in java to call sales force rest web services

Java has an URLConnection Class that has similar functions as cURL.

For interacting with the salesforce API, it is best to use a client library and not implement it all by yourself, see http://blog.palominolabs.com/2011/03/03/a-new-java-salesforce-api-library/ for an example.

Easiest way is to download cURL java wrapper like https://github.com/pjlegato/curl-java and use cURL directly in your code.
Second way is to use Runtime.getRuntime().exec("crul...") "pattern" and run curl as a normal process.

Converting cURL authentication to Java and retrieving & updating data using REST XML (Pt.2)

This is the second part of my question on converting cURL to Java
The first part is titled:
Converting cURL authentication to Java and retrieving & updating data using REST XML (Pt.1)
Third, how can I implement update, create, and delete for the api in Java? For example:
Update: curl -i -X PUT -H "Content-Type:application/xml" -H "Accept: application/xml" -d "<ticket><description>Take this description</description></ticket>" http://user:password#www.assembla.com/spaces/my_space_id/tickets/1
Delete" curl -i -X DELETE -H "Accept: application/xml" http://user:password#www.assembla.com/spaces/my_space_id/tickets/1
Create: curl -i -X POST -H "Content-Type:application/xml" -H "Accept: application/xml" -d "<ticket><summary>This is a Summary</summary><priority>3</priority></ticket>" the weblink
In other words, how can I convert these cURL code into Java?
I would really appreciate your help. Also, a good reference to do such stuff in Java will be awesome too.
Thanks.

Well, the official API usually helps: Assembla REST API
There is says that you need to use basic authentication.
For accessing REST in Java: Rest clients for Java?

you should be looking out for Apache HttpClient tutorials.
There's some Samplecode of a Android Rest Client application around, try searching for it. Also, I just discovered "resting". I haven't tried it, but might be worth a look.
Also watching the Developing Android REST client applications video from Google.io is recommended, as it is teaching some very important architectural basics and hints.
I placed a similar question some time ago, and got an answer here at Stackoverflow.