GeezerVison

The World Wide Web, restored to 800 pixels of glory.

GeezerVison is showing docs.stackstorm.com — Webhooks — StackStorm 3.9.0 documentation

Webhooks

Webhooks allow you to integrate external systems with StackStorm using HTTP webhooks. Unlike sensors which use a “pull” approach, webhooks use a “push” approach. They push triggers directly to the StackStorm API using HTTP POST requests.

Sensors vs Webhooks

Sensors integrate with external systems and services using either a polling approach (sensors periodically connect to an external system to retrieve data), or a passive approach, where they listen on some port, receiving data using whatever custom protocol you define.

Webhooks provide a built-in passive approach for receiving JSON or URL-encoded form data, via HTTP POST. This data must be “pushed” from an external system to StackStorm when an interesting event occurs.

Sensors are the preferred integration method since they offer a more granular and tighter integration.

On the other hand, webhooks come in handy when you have an existing script or software which you can easily modify to send a webhook to the StackStorm API when an interesting event occurs.

Another example where webhooks are useful is when you want to consume events from a 3rd party service that already offers webhook integration - e.g. GitHub.

Authentication

All requests to the /api/v1/webhooks endpoints need to be authenticated in the same way as other API requests. There are two possible authentication approaches - API keys and tokens. API keys are recommended for webhooks, as they do not expire. Tokens have a fixed expiry.

API key-based

Header : St2-Api-Key
Query parameter : ?st2-api-key

Token-based

Header : X-Auth-Token
Query parameter : ?x-auth-token

Both methods above support providing the authentication material as a header or query parameter. A header is usually used with your scripts where you can control request headers while query parameters are used with 3rd party services such as GitHub where you can only specify a URL.

Request Body

The request body or so called trigger payload can be either JSON or URL encoded form data. The body type is determined based on the value of the Content-Type header (application/json for JSON and application/x-www-form-urlencoded for URL encoded form data).

All the examples below assume JSON and as such, provide application/json for the Content-Type header value.

Registering a Webhook

You can register a webhook in StackStorm by specifying the core.st2.webhook trigger inside a rule definition.

Here is an excerpt from a rule which registers a new webhook named sample:

...
trigger:
        type: "core.st2.webhook"
        parameters:
            url: "sample"
...

The url: parameter above is added as a suffix to /api/v1/webhooks/ to create the URL to POST data to. So once you have created the rule above, you can use this webhook by POST-ing data to your StackStorm server at https://{$ST2_IP}/api/v1/webhooks/sample.

The request body needs to be JSON and may contain arbitrary data which you can match against in the rule criteria.

Note that all trailing and leading / of the url parameter are ignored by StackStorm. e.g. a value of /sample, sample/, /sample/ and sample are all treated the same, i.e. considered identical. They all result in an effective URL of /api/v1/webhooks/sample.

POST-ing data to a custom webhook will cause a trigger with the following attributes to be dispatched:

trigger - Trigger name.
trigger.headers - Dictionary containing the request headers.
trigger.body - Dictionary containing the request body.

This example shows how to send data to a custom webhook using curl and how to match on this data using rule criteria:

curl -X POST https://localhost/api/v1/webhooks/sample -H "X-Auth-Token: matoken" -H "Content-Type: application/json" --data '{"key1": "value1"}'

Rule:

...
trigger:
        type: "core.st2.webhook"
        parameters:
            url: "sample"

criteria:
    trigger.body.key1:
        type: "equals"
        pattern: "value1"

action:
    ref: "mypack.myaction"
    parameters:
...

Using a Generic Webhook

By default, a special-purpose webhook with the name st2 is already registered. Instead of using core.st2.webhook, it allows you to specify any trigger that is known to StackStorm (either by default or from custom sensors and triggers in packs), so you can use it to trigger rules that aren’t explicitly set up to be triggered by webhooks.

The body of this request needs to be JSON and must contain the following attributes:

trigger - Name of the trigger (e.g. mypack.mytrigger)
payload - Object with a trigger payload.

This example shows how to send data to the generic webhook using curl, and how to match this data using rule criteria (replace localhost with your StackStorm host if called remotely):

curl -X POST https://localhost/api/v1/webhooks/st2 -H "X-Auth-Token: matoken" -H "Content-Type: application/json" --data '{"trigger": "mypack.mytrigger", "payload": {"attribute1": "value1"}}'

Rule:

...
trigger:
    type: "mypack.mytrigger"

criteria:
    trigger.attribute1:
        type: "equals"
        pattern: "value1"

action:
    ref: "mypack.myaction"
    parameters:
...

The trigger.type attribute in the rule definition needs to be the same as the trigger name defined in the webhook payload body.

Listing Registered Webhooks

To list all registered webhooks, run:

st2 webhook list

My Webhook Isn’t Working!

If you’re encountering issues with webhooks, such as StackStorm failing to recognize incoming webhooks, or trigger instances not showing when expected, please see Troubleshooting Webhooks.

When Not to Use Webhooks

While webhooks are useful, they do have two drawbacks:

Not Bidirectional - Webhooks simply submit data into StackStorm. So if you want data back from StackStorm, or an action execution ID, you’ll have to get that data in an asynchronous fashion.
No Guarantee of Execution - Webhooks in StackStorm do not guarantee an execution. It depends on the rule configuration. Based upon the webhook contents, it may not execute any action, or may execute multiple actions.

If you always want to execute a specific action or workflow, and/or you’re looking for a guaranteed response, you can use the /v1/executions API. This is the same as explicitly running an action from the CLI with st2 run <mypack>.<myaction>.

We can get a little insight into how this work using the --debug flag:

st2 --debug run core.local "date"
2017-03-31 08:21:18,706  DEBUG - Using cached token from file "/home/ubuntu/.st2/token-st2admin"
# -------- begin 140183979680208 request ----------
curl -X GET -H  'Connection: keep-alive' -H  'Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate' -H  'Accept: */*' -H  'User-Agent: python-requests/2.11.1' -H  'X-Auth-Token: da5ecf3b0ab841008d663052fe95cddd' http://127.0.0.1:9101/v1/actions/core.local
# -------- begin 140183979680208 response ----------
{"name": "local", "parameters": {"cmd": {"required": true, "type": "string", "description": "Arbitrary Linux command to be executed on the local host."}, "sudo": {"immutable": true}}, "tags": [], "description": "Action that executes an arbitrary Linux command on the localhost.", "enabled": true, "entry_point": "", "notify": {}, "uid": "action:core:local", "pack": "core", "ref": "core.local", "id": "58c9663a49d4af4cbd56f84d", "runner_type": "local-shell-cmd"}
# -------- end 140183979680208 response ------------

# -------- begin 140183979680080 request ----------
curl -X GET -H  'Connection: keep-alive' -H  'Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate' -H  'Accept: */*' -H  'User-Agent: python-requests/2.11.1' -H  'X-Auth-Token: da5ecf3b0ab841008d663052fe95cddd' 'http://127.0.0.1:9101/v1/runnertypes/?name=local-shell-cmd'
# -------- begin 140183979680080 response ----------
[{"runner_module": "local_runner", "uid": "runner_type:local-shell-cmd", "description": "A runner to execute local actions as a fixed user.", "enabled": true, "runner_parameters": {"sudo": {"default": false, "type": "boolean", "description": "The command will be executed with sudo."}, "timeout": {"default": 60, "type": "integer", "description": "Action timeout in seconds. Action will get killed if it doesn't finish in timeout seconds."}, "cmd": {"type": "string", "description": "Arbitrary Linux command to be executed on the host."}, "kwarg_op": {"default": "--", "type": "string", "description": "Operator to use in front of keyword args i.e. \"--\" or \"-\"."}, "env": {"type": "object", "description": "Environment variables which will be available to the command(e.g. key1=val1,key2=val2)"}, "cwd": {"type": "string", "description": "Working directory where the command will be executed in"}}, "id": "58c9663a49d4af4cbd56f847", "name": "local-shell-cmd"}]
# -------- end 140183979680080 response ------------

# -------- begin 140183979680976 request ----------
curl -X POST -H  'Connection: keep-alive' -H  'Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate' -H  'Accept: */*' -H  'User-Agent: python-requests/2.11.1' -H  'content-type: application/json' -H  'X-Auth-Token: da5ecf3b0ab841008d663052fe95cddd' -H  'Content-Length: 69' --data-binary '{"action": "core.local", "user": null, "parameters": {"cmd": "date"}}' http://127.0.0.1:9101/v1/executions
# -------- begin 140183979680976 response ----------
{"status": "requested", "start_timestamp": "2017-03-31T08:21:18.828620Z", "log": [{"status": "requested", "timestamp": "2017-03-31T08:21:18.843043Z"}], "parameters": {"cmd": "date"}, "runner": {"runner_module": "local_runner", "uid": "runner_type:local-shell-cmd", "description": "A runner to execute local actions as a fixed user.", "enabled": true, "runner_parameters": {"sudo": {"default": false, "type": "boolean", "description": "The command will be executed with sudo."}, "timeout": {"default": 60, "type": "integer", "description": "Action timeout in seconds. Action will get killed if it doesn't finish in timeout seconds."}, "cmd": {"type": "string", "description": "Arbitrary Linux command to be executed on the host."}, "kwarg_op": {"default": "--", "type": "string", "description": "Operator to use in front of keyword args i.e. \"--\" or \"-\"."}, "env": {"type": "object", "description": "Environment variables which will be available to the command(e.g. key1=val1,key2=val2)"}, "cwd": {"type": "string", "description": "Working directory where the command will be executed in"}}, "id": "58c9663a49d4af4cbd56f847", "name": "local-shell-cmd"}, "web_url": "https://st2expect/#/history/58de117e49d4af083399181c/general", "context": {"user": "st2admin"}, "action": {"description": "Action that executes an arbitrary Linux command on the localhost.", "runner_type": "local-shell-cmd", "tags": [], "enabled": true, "pack": "core", "entry_point": "", "notify": {}, "uid": "action:core:local", "parameters": {"cmd": {"required": true, "type": "string", "description": "Arbitrary Linux command to be executed on the local host."}, "sudo": {"immutable": true}}, "ref": "core.local", "id": "58c9663a49d4af4cbd56f84d", "name": "local"}, "liveaction": {"runner_info": {}, "parameters": {"cmd": "date"}, "action_is_workflow": false, "callback": {}, "action": "core.local", "id": "58de117e49d4af083399181b"}, "id": "58de117e49d4af083399181c"}
# -------- end 140183979680976 response ------------

# -------- begin 140183979680976 request ----------
curl -X GET -H  'Connection: keep-alive' -H  'Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate' -H  'Accept: */*' -H  'User-Agent: python-requests/2.11.1' -H  'X-Auth-Token: da5ecf3b0ab841008d663052fe95cddd' http://127.0.0.1:9101/v1/executions/58de117e49d4af083399181c
# -------- begin 140183979680976 response ----------
{"status": "succeeded", "start_timestamp": "2017-03-31T08:21:18.828620Z", "log": [{"status": "requested", "timestamp": "2017-03-31T08:21:18.843000Z"}, {"status": "scheduled", "timestamp": "2017-03-31T08:21:18.943000Z"}, {"status": "running", "timestamp": "2017-03-31T08:21:19.041000Z"}, {"status": "succeeded", "timestamp": "2017-03-31T08:21:19.242000Z"}], "parameters": {"cmd": "date"}, "runner": {"runner_module": "local_runner", "uid": "runner_type:local-shell-cmd", "enabled": true, "name": "local-shell-cmd", "runner_parameters": {"sudo": {"default": false, "type": "boolean", "description": "The command will be executed with sudo."}, "timeout": {"default": 60, "type": "integer", "description": "Action timeout in seconds. Action will get killed if it doesn't finish in timeout seconds."}, "cmd": {"type": "string", "description": "Arbitrary Linux command to be executed on the host."}, "kwarg_op": {"default": "--", "type": "string", "description": "Operator to use in front of keyword args i.e. \"--\" or \"-\"."}, "env": {"type": "object", "description": "Environment variables which will be available to the command(e.g. key1=val1,key2=val2)"}, "cwd": {"type": "string", "description": "Working directory where the command will be executed in"}}, "id": "58c9663a49d4af4cbd56f847", "description": "A runner to execute local actions as a fixed user."}, "elapsed_seconds": 0.378813, "web_url": "https://st2expect/#/history/58de117e49d4af083399181c/general", "result": {"failed": false, "stderr": "", "return_code": 0, "succeeded": true, "stdout": "Fri Mar 31 08:21:19 UTC 2017"}, "context": {"user": "st2admin"}, "action": {"runner_type": "local-shell-cmd", "name": "local", "parameters": {"cmd": {"required": true, "type": "string", "description": "Arbitrary Linux command to be executed on the local host."}, "sudo": {"immutable": true}}, "tags": [], "enabled": true, "entry_point": "", "notify": {}, "uid": "action:core:local", "pack": "core", "ref": "core.local", "id": "58c9663a49d4af4cbd56f84d", "description": "Action that executes an arbitrary Linux command on the localhost."}, "liveaction": {"runner_info": {"hostname": "st2expect", "pid": 1657}, "parameters": {"cmd": "date"}, "action_is_workflow": false, "callback": {}, "action": "core.local", "id": "58de117e49d4af083399181b"}, "id": "58de117e49d4af083399181c", "end_timestamp": "2017-03-31T08:21:19.207433Z"}
# -------- end 140183979680976 response -----------

id: 58de117e49d4af083399181c
status: succeeded
parameters:
  cmd: date
result:
  failed: false
  return_code: 0
  stderr: ''
  stdout: Fri Mar 31 08:21:19 UTC 2017
  succeeded: true

In addition to the “usual” output that shows the result of the execution, the --debug flag also shows all the API calls made during the course of the entire interaction, in the form of curl commands.

That output shows the API calls made when executing the command from the StackStorm host. If you are accessing the API from a remote system, it will be proxied through nginx, using the /api URI. So remote calls will take this form:

curl -X POST https://[ST2_IP]/api/v1/executions -H  'Connection: keep-alive' -H  'Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate' -H  'Accept: */*' -H  'User-Agent: python-requests/2.11.1' -H  'content-type: application/json' -H  'X-Auth-Token: matoken' -H  'Content-Length: 69' --data-binary '{"action": "core.local", "user": null, "parameters": {"cmd": "date"}}'

v: 3.9

Versions: 3.10dev; 3.9; 3.8; 3.7

You are visitor 01402503 — GeezerVison does not store the pages you look up.
Best viewed with Netscape Navigator 4.7 or Internet Explorer 6 at 800×600. No cookies required.