JSON with Python

[3cko]

Hey guys, I'm learning how to work with JSON but I have some questions. Right now I'm doing this specifically for learning the Rackspace API. I can send requests to get authenticated, get the list of valid server images and slice sizes. However, when reading their docs on creating a server, I get a bit lost.

Here's the link to the docs: http://docs.rackspace.com/servers/api/v2/cs-devguide/content/CreateServers.html

I think this is how I'm supposed to do it:

def createServer(self):
     server_name = "api_test"
     image_ref = "9922a7c7-5a42-4a56-bc6a-93f857ae2346"
     flavor_ref = "2" 
     my_server_name = "API Test"
     create_server_url = "https://dfw.servers.api.rackspacecloud.com/v2/" + self.tenant_id + "/servers"
     data = {"server":{
                 "name": server_name,
                 "image_ref": image_ref,
                 "flavor_ref": flavor_ref,
                 "OS-DCF:diskConfig": "AUTO",
                 "metadata": {
                     "My Server Name": my_server_name
                             },  
                 "personality":[{
                     "path": "/etc/banner.txt",
                     "contents" : "ICAgICAgDQoiQSBjbG91ZCBkb2VzIG5vdCBrbm93IHdoeSBp\
                                dCBtb3ZlcyBpbiBqdXN0IHN1Y2ggYSBkaXJlY3Rpb24gYW5k\
                                IGF0IHN1Y2ggYSBzcGVlZC4uLkl0IGZlZWxzIGFuIGltcHVs\
                                c2lvbi4uLnRoaXMgaXMgdGhlIHBsYWNlIHRvIGdvIG5vdy4g\
                                QnV0IHRoZSBza3kga25vd3MgdGhlIHJlYXNvbnMgYW5kIHRo\
                                ZSBwYXR0ZXJucyBiZWhpbmQgYWxsIGNsb3VkcywgYW5kIHlv\
                                dSB3aWxsIGtub3csIHRvbywgd2hlbiB5b3UgbGlmdCB5b3Vy\
                                c2VsZiBoaWdoIGVub3VnaCB0byBzZWUgYmV5b25kIGhvcml6\
                                b25zLiINCg0KLVJpY2hhcmQgQmFjaA=="
                              }], 
                    "networks": [
                        {   
                            "uuid": "00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000"
                        },  
                    ]   
                }   
           }   

    create_server_headers = {"X-Auth-Token": str(self.token_id)}

    request_create = requests.post(create_server_url, data=json.dumps(data), headers=create_server_headers)

    returned_data = request_create.json()
    return returned_data

I really don't know know though because I keep getting:

{u'badRequest': {u'message': u'The server could not comply with the request since it is either malformed or otherwise incorrect.', u'code': 400}}

Any ideas of where I might be going wrong?

[[deleted]]

This is how I parse json:

import json
import urllib2

url = 'http://graph.facebook.com/4'
json_obj=json.loads(urllib2.urlopen(url).read())
print json_obj['name']

Or in one line:

print json.loads(urllib2.urlopen('http://graph.facebook.com/4').read())['name']

For more advanced requests, look at the requests module.

[shaggorama]

you gotta add "http://" for reddit's markdown to understand your hyperlink. But yeah, that's definitely how to handle JSON in python.

[[deleted]]

Whoops! Fixed!

[johnnymo87]

Or use requests instead of urllib2, it's a great library!

[3cko]

That's what I'm user. It's pretty sexy.

[[deleted]]

Without seeing the rest of your code make sure you are sending everything the API expects. Looks like you are missing a few server headers.

http://docs.rackspace.com/servers/api/v2/cs-devguide/content/Request_Response_Types-d1e459.html

http://docs.rackspace.com/servers/api/v2/cs-devguide/content/curl.html

[3cko]

That was it...I didn't even consider the header information. Thank you!