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Introduction

The API requires a token sent on each request via the Authorization header to authenticate. This token can be obtained by making a POST request to the URI /auth/request-token where you'll include your VSKEY credentials using the Authorization Header.

 

On this page:

Request Access Token

This section shows how to request an access token using HTTPie and CURL.

Authentication tokens are valid for 24 hours (86,400 sec). After this period, a new token must be requested.

HTTPie

http POST https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/auth/request-token -a <username>
http: password for <username>@vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001:
Response Headers 
 HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Allow: POST, OPTIONS
Connection: keep-alive
Content-Length: 179
Content-Type: application/json
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2016 11:52:47 GMT
Strict-Transport-Security: max-age=63072000
X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff
X-Frame-Options: DENY
X-RateLimit-Limit: 5
X-RateLimit-Remaining: 4
X-RateLimit-Reset: 1461930780
Response Body 
{
    "duration": 86400, 
    "token": "<token_here>", 
    "user": "<username>"
} 

CURL

curl -X POST https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/auth/request-token -u <username>Enter host password for user '<username>':
Response Headers 
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Server: nginx
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2016 12:00:20 GMT
Content-Type: application/json
Content-Length: 179
Connection: keep-alive
X-RateLimit-Remaining: 4
X-RateLimit-Limit: 5
X-RateLimit-Reset: 1461931230
Allow: POST, OPTIONS
Strict-Transport-Security: max-age=63072000
X-Frame-Options: DENY
X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff
Response Body 
{
  "duration": 86400, 
  "token": "<token_here>", 
  "user": "<username>"
}⏎

Unauthorized

Getting a 401 Unauthorized error as shown below when requesting a new access token, could be due to the following reasons:

Response 
HTTP/1.1 401 UNAUTHORIZED

Username and password combination is not valid

Re-initializing your VSKEY credentials is strongly advised. To do so, please follow this KB Article.

Response 
HTTP/1.0 401 UNAUTHORIZED
Allow: POST, OPTIONS
Content-Length: 115
Content-Type: application/json
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2016 13:55:25 GMT

{
    "error": "authentication error", 
    "message": "Invalid username and password combination.", 
    "status": 401
}

User is not permitted to access the API

Contacting the VSS Team to request access is advised by email or our contact form.

Response 
HTTP/1.0 401 UNAUTHORIZED
Allow: POST, OPTIONS
Content-Length: 106
Content-Type: application/json
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2016 13:55:51 GMT

{
    "error": "authentication error", 
    "message": "User is not authorized to access.", 
    "status": 401
}

Using Access Token

At this point you have already generated an access token to use the API valid for a certain period of time. Now, this token can be used for every request sent to any API endpoint via GET, POST, PUT, PATCH. The OPTIONS method does not require the Authorization Header.

Using your access token is quite simple and you have a few options depending the tool you use. In this section we will demonstrate how to use the access token with HTTPie and CURL:

HTTPie

Assuming there's been set the access token value in the environment variable TK, you can make a simple get request to the /v2 resource:

http GET https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2 -a $TK
Response Headers 
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Allow: HEAD, OPTIONS, GET
Connection: keep-alive
Content-Encoding: gzip
Content-Type: application/json
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2016 14:11:09 GMT
Strict-Transport-Security: max-age=63072000
Transfer-Encoding: chunked
Vary: Accept-Encoding
X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff
X-Frame-Options: DENY
X-RateLimit-Limit: 7200
X-RateLimit-Remaining: 7199
X-RateLimit-Reset: 1461942000
Response Body 
{
    "_links": {
        "domain": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/domain/", 
        "folder:": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/folder/", 
        "image": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/image/", 
        "inventory": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/inventory/", 
        "iso": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/iso/", 
        "network": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/network/", 
        "os": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/os/", 
        "request": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/request/", 
        "session": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/session/", 
        "status": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/status/", 
        "template": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/template/", 
        "version": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/version/", 
        "vm": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/vm/"
    }, 
    "meta": {
        "time": "0.00341s", 
        "user": "jm"
    }
}

CURL

curl -X GET https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2 -u $TK
Response Headers 
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Allow: HEAD, OPTIONS, GET
Connection: keep-alive
Content-Encoding: gzip
Content-Type: application/json
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2016 14:11:09 GMT
Strict-Transport-Security: max-age=63072000
Transfer-Encoding: chunked
Vary: Accept-Encoding
X-Content-Type-Options: nosniff
X-Frame-Options: DENY
X-RateLimit-Limit: 7200
X-RateLimit-Remaining: 7199
X-RateLimit-Reset: 1461942000
Response Body 
{
  "meta": {
    "user": "jm", 
    "time": "0.00341s"
  }, 
  "_links": {
    "status": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/status/", 
    "domain": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/domain/", 
    "network": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/network/", 
    "folder:": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/folder/", 
    "image": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/image/", 
    "request": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/request/", 
    "vm": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/vm/", 
    "session": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/session/", 
    "iso": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/iso/", 
    "inventory": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/inventory/", 
    "version": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/version/", 
    "os": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/os/", 
    "template": "https://vss-ws.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/v2/template/"
  }
}⏎

Unauthorized

Getting a 401 Unauthorized error as shown below when using an access token, could be due to the following reasons:

Expired Token

Generate a new token as previously described /auth/request-token

Response 
HTTP/1.0 401 UNAUTHORIZED
Allow: HEAD, OPTIONS, GET
Content-Length: 103
Content-Type: application/json
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2016 14:19:39 GMT
Location: https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/auth/request-token

{
    "error": "authentication error", 
    "message": "Valid token, but has expired. ", 
    "status": 401
}

Invalid Token

Either a typo or something at our end went wrong. Just generate a new access token at  /auth/request-token

Response 
HTTP/1.0 401 UNAUTHORIZED
Allow: HEAD, OPTIONS, GET
Content-Length: 103
Content-Type: application/json
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2016 14:19:39 GMT
Location: https://vss-api.eis.utoronto.ca:8001/auth/request-token

{
    "error": "authentication error", 
    "message": "Invalid token.", 
    "status": 401
}

User is no longer authorized to access the API

Contacting the VSS Team to request or restore access is advised by email or our contact form.

Response 
HTTP/1.0 401 UNAUTHORIZED
Allow: POST, OPTIONS
Content-Length: 106
Content-Type: application/json
Date: Fri, 29 Apr 2016 13:55:51 GMT

{
    "error": "authentication error", 
    "message": "User is not authorized to access.", 
    "status": 401
}
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