REST
Abstract
The REST Interface gives you access to your RT Database. The complete communication is encapsulated in the HTTP protocol. The interface should be accessible in your installation.
Though you may see references to older 3.x releases of RT below, the REST 1.0 interface has not changed in any significant way in 4.x.
This page is for REST version 1.0. The next version of the RT REST interface, version 2.0, is available as an extension.
Legacy Comments are available from the previous Wikia instance.
Interface
Base URL: .../REST/1.0/
. The default response should be:
RT/3.4.5 200 Ok
# Invalid object specification: 'index.html'
id: index.html
Authentication
The REST Interface does not support HTTP-Authentication. So you must get a valid Session-Token and submit the cookie each request. You usually get a Session-Cookie by submitting the default login form. Use variables "user
" for login and "pass
" for password values. wget doesn't escape any characters in the --post-data option so make sure you properly escape any special characters in the password.
See the wget invocation line below:
wget --keep-session-cookies \ --save-cookies cookies.txt \ --post-data 'user=UUUU&pass=PPPP' \ http://my.rt.server
You need the -keep-session-cookies option to make wget save session cookies.
Ticket
Ticket Properties
Gets the data for a single ticket, not including the history and comments.
Request: /REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/show
RT/3.4.5 200 Ok id: ticket/<ticket-id> Queue: <...> Owner: <...> Creator: <...> Subject: <...> Status: <...> Priority: <...> InitialPriority: <...> FinalPriority: <...> Requestors: <...> Cc: <...> AdminCc: <...> Created: <...> Starts: <...> Started: <...> Due: <...> Resolved: <...> Told: <...> TimeEstimated: <...> TimeWorked: <...> TimeLeft: <...>
Ticket Links
Gets the ticket links for a single ticket.
Request: REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/links/show
RT/3.8.2 200 Ok id: ticket/<ticket-id>/links HasMember: fsck.com-rt://your.server.com/ticket/<another-id> ReferredToBy: fsck.com-rt://your.server.com/ticket/<another-id> DependedOnBy: fsck.com-rt://your.server.com/ticket/<another-id> MemberOf: fsck.com-rt://your.server.com/ticket/<another-id> RefersTo: fsck.com-rt://your.server.com/ticket/<another-id> DependsOn: fsck.com-rt://your.server.com/ticket/<another-id>
Ticket Attachments
Gets a list of all attachments related to the ticket
Request: /REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/attachments
Ticket Attachment
Gets the metadata and content of a specific attachment.
Request: /REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/attachments/<attachment-id>
RT/3.8.0 200 Ok id: <attachment-id> Subject: Creator: <user-id> Created: <timestamp> Transaction: <transaction-id> Parent: <parent-id> MessageId: Filename: <filename> ContentType: application/octet-stream ContentEncoding: none Headers: MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: MIME-tools 5.427 (Entity 5.427) Content-Type: application/octet-stream; name="<filename>" Content-Disposition: inline; filename="<filename>" Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64 Content-Length: <length in bytes> Content: ... ... ...
NOTE: RT returns the content indented with 9 spaces on each line, so that it lines up with the "Content:" header. Even if you strip this out with a regexp, the content is still UTF-8, which is probably not what you want. To get the original binary data back, strip out the 9 spaces with a regexp, strip off the 3 carriage returns at the end, and then convert the whole thing from UTF-8 to the native character encoding of the attachment, whatever that is. RT doesn't tell you, so you have know. If the attachments were uploaded by a U.S. Windows system, odds are that Windows-1252 is what you want. If you can't get the binary back intact, see the next method below.
Ticket Attachment Content
Gets the attachment data content without additional metadata or whitespace characters
Request: /REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/attachments/<attachment-id>/content
RT/3.8.0 200 Ok ... ... ...
So to get the original content you still have to strip the first 2 lines of the response.
Ticket History
Gets a list of all the history items for a given ticket.
Request: /REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/history
RT/3.4.5 200 Ok # <history-count>/<history-count> (/total) <history-id>: <history-name> <history-id>: <history-name> ...
You will get an additional row, for each history entry found. The first entry is usually: "Ticket created by ...
".
There are two ways to get history item detail: you can do one of these and then recursively perform ticket/history/id/<history-id>
for each history-id from this REST call, but that is extremely wasteful and will scale horribly. What you really want to do is one REST call but get the long format:
Request: /REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/history?format=l
RT/3.8.2 200 Ok # <n>/<n> (id/<history-id>/total) id: <history-id> Ticket: <ticket-id> TimeTaken: <...> Type: <...> Field: <...> OldValue: <...> NewValue: <...> Data: <...> Description: <...> Content: <...> Creator: <...> Created: <...> Attachments: <attachment-id>: <filename> (<size>) <attachment-id>: <filename> (<size>) -- # <n>/<n> (id/<history-id>/total) ...
NOTE: the double dash "--" will occur in the long format between each history item. You can split the output on "--" and iterate over it, parsing out the data with an RFC822 parser, such as an email handling library.
Ticket History Entry
Gets the history information for a single history item. Note that the history item must actually correspond to the ticket.
Request: /REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/history/id/<history-id>
RT/3.4.5 200 Ok # 70/70 (id/114856/total) id: <history-id> Ticket: <ticket-id> TimeTaken: <...> Type: <...> Field: <...> OldValue: <...> NewValue: <...> Data: <...> Description: <...> Content: <lin1-0> <line-1> ... <line-n> Creator: <...> Created: <...> Attachments: <...>
IMPORTANT NOTE: At least with RT 3.8.0, when you request a history item with this method AND you have attached a file that has Mime type text/plain to the same item (eg. a comment with an attachement), RT will return the complete content of the attachment for the key "Content:" and not your real comment that you can see in the web frontend. This may lead to some problems if the requestor does not expect to get a comment content that is for example 1.8 MB of text. With other Mime type attachments this however seems to work. I don't know if this is a feature or a bug.
Ticket Search
Request: /REST/1.0/search/ticket?query=<query>&orderby=<sort-order>&format=<format>
Parameters
query
You can use any query generated by the query builder - or feel free to write your own. Here an example that will do the following: Find all tickets that have no owner and the status new or open
query= Owner = 'Nobody' AND ( Status = 'new' OR Status = 'open' )
Example: to get all the tickets in "fooQueue" you'd access:
/REST/1.0/search/ticket?query=Queue='fooQueue'
Example: to get the tickets for a custom field "Contact Name" you'd access:
/REST/1.0/search/ticket?query='CF.{Contact Name}'='Shaun Wallace'
orderby
By this parameter you can change the sort field and order of the search result. To sort a list ascending just put a + before the fieldname, otherwise a -. Eg: -Created (will put the newest tickets at the beginning).
Example:
/REST/1.0/search/ticket?query=Queue='fooQueue'&orderby=+Created
format
- i: ticket/<ticket-id>
- s: <ticket-id>: <ticket-subject>
- l: a multi-line format
Example:
/REST/1.0/search/ticket?query=Queue='fooQueue'&orderby=+Created&format=i
fields
A list of fields you would like included in the result set.
Example:
/REST/1.0/search/ticket?query=id=42&format=l&fields=Subject,Status,Priority,CF.\{Category\}
Note that you may need to escape characters like the curly braces for CFs.
Ticket Create
To create a new ticket: post on /REST/1.0/ticket/new
with a variable named "content
",
containing "key: value
" line by line, example:
Testing the new ticket section
id: ticket/new Queue: <queue name> Requestor: <requestor email address> Subject: <subject> Cc: <...> AdminCc: <...> Owner: <...> Status: <...> Priority: <...> InitialPriority: <...> FinalPriority: <...> TimeEstimated: <...> Starts: <...> Due: <...> Text: <The ticket content> CF-<CustomFieldName>: <CustomFieldValue>
If there are any "special" characters (Umlauts, dash, ...?) in a custom field's name, you can still access it via its ID:
CF-$id: <Value>
If you want to have a multiline Text, prefix every line with a blank.
Due: <...> Text: This is a multiline Text !!! CF-<CustomFieldName>: <CustomFieldValue>
The response should look like:
RT/4.0.6 200 Ok # Ticket 775 created.
curl example
* Create a file containing the ticket form:
id: ticket/new Queue: queue1 Requestor: requestor@email Priority: 4 CF-Type of request: Demande Subject: Test REST Text: Multi line test with special chars: é
* Submit using curl:
curl --data-urlencode content@file.name 'https://HOSTNAME/REST/1.0/ticket/new?user=USER&pass=PASSWORD'
Ticket Edit
To update an existing ticket: post on /REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/edit
with a variable named "content", containing "key: value" line by line (like the one displayed when issuing ticket/<ticket-id>/show
). Example:
Priority: 5 TimeWorked: 15
- PHP
$username = rt_user; $password = rt_pass; $url = "http://server.domain.tld/REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket id>/edit?user=$username&pass=$password"; $request = new HttpRequest($url, HTTP_METH_POST); $post_data=array("content"=>"AdminCc: userX\nText: This is a REST test edit ticket\n"); // add the post fields $request->addPostFields($postData); // response from RT $response = $request->send()->getBody(); print_r($response);
Tickets History Reply
Same as comment: post on /REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/comment
with a variable name content
, containing "key: value
" line by line:
id: <ticket-id> Action: correspond Text: the text comment Cc: <...> Bcc: <...> TimeWorked: <...> Attachment: an attachment filename/path
Cc
and Bcc
are for this reply only (I think).
Ticket History Comment
To add a comment to an existing ticket: POST on "/REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/comment
" with a variable name "content
", containing "key: value
" line by line:
id: <ticket-id> Action: comment Text: the text comment Attachment: an attachment filename/path
Action can be "comment
" or "correspond
". For a list of fields you can use in correspondence, try "/opt/rt3/bin/rt correspond ticket/1
"
If your comment contains multiple lines, each new line must be preceded by a space (e.g. "line 1\n line 2").
If you want to use HTML replies, use
Content-Type: text/html
If you used "Attachment
", you must add to your POST a variable "attachment_1
" that contains the raw attachment in multi-part file object.
You can upload more attachments as well, in this case you have to separate the file names in the "Attachment
" with "\n "(a newline and space, without quotes) and add a new variable "attachment_$i" to your POST where $i is the index of attachment.
You need to send header to post comments
Ticket Links Edit
To update links on an existing ticket: POST on "/REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket-id>/links
" with a variable named "content
", containing "key: value
" line by line (like the one displayed when issuing "ticket/<ticket-id>/links
"). Example:
DependsOn: 54354 RefersTo: http://some.external/link
Ticket Merge
To merge tickets: POST on "/REST/1.0/ticket/<origin-ticket-id>/merge/<into-ticket-id>
". (I don't think any content is required, but I send "id" and "into" anyway.)
User Properties
Gets the data for a single user.
Request: /REST/1.0/user/<user-id>
RT/3.8.4 200 Ok id: user/<user-id> Name: <...> Password: ******** EmailAddress: <...> RealName: <...> Organization: <...> Privileged: <...> Disabled: <...>
Also you can use user login instead of user ID.
User
User Create
To create a new user: post on /REST/1.0/user/new
with a variable named "content
", containing "key: value
" line by line, like the response to /user/<ticket-id>
User Edit
To update an existing user: post on /REST/1.0/user/<user-id>/edit
with a variable named "content", containing "key: value" line by line (like the one displayed when issuing user/<user-id>/show
).
Queue
Search for all queues mail addresses like thist:
/REST/1.0/search/queue?query=\&fields=CorrespondAddress,CommentAddress
Single queue properties
Gets the data for a single queue.
Request: /REST/1.0/queue/<queue-id>
RT/3.8.4 200 Ok id: queue/<queue-id> Name: <...> Description: <...> CorrespondAddress: <...> CommentAddress: <...> InitialPriority: <...> FinalPriority: <...> DefaultDueIn: <...>
Logout
To logout: post on /REST/1.0/logout
with empty content.
Types
- new
- open
- stalled
- resolved
- rejected
- deleted
+ other custom values defined in you local RT portal.
History entry type
- Create
- CustomField
- EmailRecord
- Status
- CommentEmailRecord
- Correspond
- Comment
- Priority
- Give
- Steal
- Take
- Untake
- AddWatcher
- DeleteWatcher
- AddLink
- DeleteLink
- AddReminder
- OpenReminder
- ResolveReminder
- Set
- Force
- Subject
- Told
- PurgeTransaction
Miscellaneous
Data format
- History entries time returns in UTC, boolean returns as
1
(true) and0
(false).
- Use only
"\n"
, not"\r\n"
in post content.
- Comments in response body starts with with a hash (
#
) symbol.
Request status
To get real request/post status you need to check status code in first line of server response.
Examples
Perl
To get the results of a single request (without setting the Session-Cookie) - assuming you've set:
- $uri to your RT REST URL
- $access_user to your username
- $access_password to your password
- $ticketNumber to the ticket you want to see
my $ua = LWP::UserAgent->new; $ua->timeout(10); $ua->agent("YOURUSERAGENTHERE"); my $response = $ua->post($uri."ticket/$ticketNumber", ['user' => $access_user, 'pass' => $access_password], 'Content_Type' => 'form-data'); if ($response->is_success) { print $response->decoded_content; }
Java
import java.io.IOException; import org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpClient; import org.apache.commons.httpclient.methods.PostMethod; import org.apache.commons.httpclient.methods.multipart.MultipartRequestEntity; import org.apache.commons.httpclient.methods.multipart.Part; import org.apache.commons.httpclient.methods.multipart.StringPart; public class RtTicketCreator { static final String BASE_URI = "http://rt.xxx.com/REST/1.0"; public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException { PostMethod mPost = new PostMethod(BASE_URI + "/ticket/new?user=username&pass=password"); Part[] parts = { new StringPart("content", "Queue: General\nSubject: 123") }; mPost.setRequestEntity(new MultipartRequestEntity(parts, mPost.getParams())); HttpClient cl = new HttpClient(); cl.executeMethod(mPost); System.out.println(mPost.getResponseBodyAsString()); } }
Java ( Based on new Apache HttpComponents library )
/* * RT ticket creator based on the current Apache HttpComponents library 4.1.3 * Created by Koustubha Kale, kmkale at youtility dot in */ import org.apache.http.HttpEntity; import org.apache.http.HttpResponse; import org.apache.http.auth.AuthScope; import org.apache.http.auth.UsernamePasswordCredentials; import org.apache.http.client.HttpClient; import org.apache.http.client.methods.HttpPost; import org.apache.http.entity.mime.MultipartEntity; import org.apache.http.entity.mime.content.StringBody; import org.apache.http.impl.client.DefaultHttpClient; import org.apache.http.util.EntityUtils; public class NewApacheHttpcomponentsRtTicketCreator { public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception { DefaultHttpClient httpclient = new DefaultHttpClient(); try { HttpPost httppost = new HttpPost("http://rt.xxx.com/rt/REST/1.0" + "/ticket/new?user=username&pass=password"); StringBody content = new StringBody("Queue: General\nSubject: 123"); MultipartEntity reqEntity = new MultipartEntity(); reqEntity.addPart("content", content); httppost.setEntity(reqEntity); System.out.println("executing request " + httppost.getRequestLine()); HttpResponse response = httpclient.execute(httppost); HttpEntity resEntity = response.getEntity(); System.out.println("----------------------------------------"); System.out.println(response.getStatusLine()); if (resEntity != null) { System.out.println("Response content length: " + resEntity.getContentLength()); } EntityUtils.consume(resEntity); } finally { try { httpclient.getConnectionManager().shutdown(); } catch (Exception ignore) {} } } }
Python
import cookielib import urllib import urllib2 # creates a cookie for the rtserver with the credentials given at initialization. # define your credentials here access_user = 'your_login' access_password = 'your_password' # here is the RequestTracker URI we try to access uri = 'http://your-rt-instance.com/REST/1.0/' # trying login on rt server cj = cookielib.LWPCookieJar() opener = urllib2.build_opener(urllib2.HTTPCookieProcessor(cj)) urllib2.install_opener(opener) data = {'user': access_user, 'pass': access_password} ldata = urllib.urlencode(data) login = urllib2.Request(uri, ldata) try: response = urllib2.urlopen(login) print response.read() print "login successful" except urllib2.URLError: # could not connect to server print "Not able to login"
Ruby
#!/usr/bin/env ruby require 'net/http' user = 'username' pass = 'password' uri = URI('https://rt.example.com/REST/1.0/ticket/123/show') req = Net::HTTP::Post.new(uri.path) req.set_form_data('user' => user, 'pass' => pass) res = Net::HTTP.start(uri.hostname, uri.port, :use_ssl => uri.scheme == 'https', :set_debug_output => $stderr) do |http| http.request(req) end case res when Net::HTTPSuccess, Net::HTTPRedirection # OK puts "HTTP response code: #{res.code}" puts "HTTP message: #{res.message}" puts "Response:" res.each do |key,val| puts "#{key} => #{val}" end puts "Data:" puts res.body else res.value end
PHP
$username = rt_user; $password = rt_pass; $url = "http://server.domain.tld/REST/1.0/ticket/<ticket id>/show?user=$username&pass=$password"; $request = new HttpRequest($url, HTTP_METH_GET); /* if you want's to pass additional parameters */ $request->addQueryData(array()); $response = $request->send(); print_r($response);
OR
$username = rt_user; $password = rt_pass; $url = "http://server.domain.tld/REST/1.0/ticket/new?user=$username&pass=$password"; $request = new HttpRequest($url, HTTP_METH_POST); // Note : to add data in custom fields you need to add element like below example // in $post_data array // Example : \nCF-customfield1:testdata $post_data=array("content"=>"Queue: General\nRequestor: user@domain\nSubject: REST test 1\nOwner: userX\nAdminCc: userX\nText: This is a REST test\n"); $request->addPostFields($post_data); try { response = $request->send()->getBody(); print_r($response); }catch (HttpException $ex) { echo $ex;
}
C#
// Using "WCF REST Starter Kit" (http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/netframework/cc950529.aspx) using (var client = new HttpClient("http://rt.site.com/REST/1.0/")) { client.TransportSettings.Cookies = new CookieContainer(); var form = new HttpUrlEncodedForm(); form.Add("user", "LOGIN"); form.Add("pass", "PASSWORD"); client.Post(string.Empty, form.CreateHttpContent()); // 1. Get ticket data using (var request = client.Get("ticket/1234/show")) { string content = request.Content.ReadAsString(); // Some logic } // 2. Post ticket reply with attachment var formPost = new HttpMultipartMimeForm(); byte[] attachment = new byte[]; string content = string.Empty; // Store data in attachment // Store data in content string ("Field: Value" line by line) // ... formPost.Add("content", content); formPost.Add("attachment_1", "attachment_1", HttpContent.Create(attachment, "application/octet-stream")); using (var post = client.Post("ticket/1234/comment"), formPost.CreateHttpContent())) // Some logic }
Powershell (v3)
- Escape Powershell reserved chars in user/pass
- If connecting via SSL, use fqdn of server, not cname
- Use `n (newline) when composing new ticket structure
Read RT queue based on query:
$servername="Your Servername here" $u="user=Username" $p="pass=Password" $q="search/ticket?query=(Status='open' OR Status='new') AND (Queue='GENERAL' OR Queue='FOO') AND Owner='Nobody'" $uri="https://" + $servername + "/rt/REST/1.0/" + $q + "&" + $u + "&" + $p $RT=Invoke-WebRequest -Uri $uri -SessionVariable sess $rt.Content
VB.NET
Public Sub AddAttachmentToRT(ByVal url As String, ByVal fileName As String, ByVal filePath As String) Dim dataBoundary As String = "--xYzZY" Dim request As HttpWebRequest Dim fileType As String = "image/jpeg" 'Create a POST web request to the REST interface using the passed URL request = CType(WebRequest.Create(url), HttpWebRequest) request.ContentType = "multipart/form-data; boundary=xYzZY" request.Method = "POST" request.KeepAlive = True 'Write the request to the requestStream Using requestStream As IO.Stream = request.GetRequestStream() 'Create a variable "attachment_1" in the POST, specify the file name and file type Dim preAttachment As String = dataBoundary + vbCrLf _ + "Content-Disposition: form-data; name=""attachment_1""; filename=""" + fileName + """" + vbCrLf _ + "Content-Type: " + fileType + vbCrLf _ + vbCrLf 'Convert this preAttachment string to bytes Dim preAttachmentBytes As Byte() = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(preAttachment) 'Write this preAttachment string to the stream requestStream.Write(preAttachmentBytes, 0, preAttachmentBytes.Length) 'Write the file as bytes to the stream by passing its exact location Using fileStream As New IO.FileStream(Server.MapPath(filePath + fileName), IO.FileMode.Open, IO.FileAccess.Read) Dim buffer(4096) As Byte Dim bytesRead As Int32 = fileStream.Read(buffer, 0, buffer.Length) Do While (bytesRead > 0) requestStream.Write(buffer, 0, bytesRead) bytesRead = fileStream.Read(buffer, 0, buffer.Length) Loop End Using 'Create a variable named content in the POST, specify the attachment name and comment text Dim postAttachment As String = vbCrLf _ + dataBoundary + vbCrLf _ + "Content-Disposition: form-data; name=""content""" + vbCrLf _ + vbCrLf _ + "Action: comment" + vbLf _ + "Attachment: " + fileName + vbCrLf _ + "Text: Whatever You Want" + vbCrLf _ + vbCrLf _ + "--xYzZY--" 'Convert postAttachment string to bytes Dim postAttachmentBytes As Byte() = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(postAttachment) 'Write the postAttachment string to the stream requestStream.Write(postAttachmentBytes, 0, postAttachmentBytes.Length) End Using Dim response As Net.WebResponse = Nothing 'Get the response from our REST request to RT 'Required to capture response, without this Try-Catch attaching will fail Try response = request.GetResponse() Using responseStream As IO.Stream = response.GetResponseStream() Using responseReader As New IO.StreamReader(responseStream) Dim responseText = responseReader.ReadToEnd() End Using End Using Catch exception As Net.WebException response = exception.Response If (response IsNot Nothing) Then Using reader As New IO.StreamReader(response.GetResponseStream()) Dim responseText = reader.ReadToEnd() End Using response.Close() End If Finally request = Nothing End Try End Sub
JavaScript
This is an example of updating the RefersTo field for a ticket. Assuming Zepto/jQuery is also being used.
function link_back(url, ticket_num, rt) { var data, link; link = "refersto: " + url; data = {"content": link}; $.ajax({ type: "POST", url: rt + ticket_num + "/links", data: data, success: function (reply) { console.log(reply); } }); } var url = "https://www.wikipedia.org/"; var ticket_num = "123456"; var rt = "https://some.rt.url/REST/1.0/ticket/"; link_back(url, ticket_num, rt);
Convenience libraries
There are libraries which do much of the low-level work shown in the examples below for you, and provide an easier programming interface for dealing with RT:
Language | Package/Module | Source | Example | Note |
---|---|---|---|---|
Perl | RT::Client::REST | Google Code | "perl -MCPAN -e install RT::Client::REST"
|
|
Ruby | rt-client | GitHub | gem install rt-client
|
|
Ruby | Roart | GitHub | gem install roart
|
|
Python | rtapi | GitHub | pip install rtapi
|
|
Python | rtkit | GitHub | pip install python-rtkit
|
|
Python | python-rt | Github | pip install rt
|
|
Java | RT-REST | GitHub | N/A
|
|
PHP | RTPHPLib | GitHub | composer require dersam/rt-php-lib |