Note
You are viewing the documentation for an older version of boto (boto2).
Boto3, the next version of Boto, is now stable and recommended for general use. It can be used side-by-side with Boto in the same project, so it is easy to start using Boto3 in your existing projects as well as new projects. Going forward, API updates and all new feature work will be focused on Boto3.
For more information, see the documentation for boto3.
An Introduction to boto’s Support interface¶
This tutorial focuses on the boto interface to Amazon Web Services Support,
allowing you to programmatically interact with cases created with Support.
This tutorial assumes that you have already downloaded and installed boto
.
Creating a Connection¶
The first step in accessing Support is to create a connection to the service. There are two ways to do this in boto. The first is:
>>> from boto.support.connection import SupportConnection
>>> conn = SupportConnection('<aws access key>', '<aws secret key>')
At this point the variable conn
will point to a SupportConnection
object. In this example, the AWS access key and AWS secret key are passed in to
the method explicitly. Alternatively, you can set the environment variables:
- AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID
- Your AWS Access Key ID
- AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY
- Your AWS Secret Access Key
and then call the constructor without any arguments, like this:
>>> conn = SupportConnection()
There is also a shortcut function in boto that makes it easy to create Support connections:
>>> import boto.support
>>> conn = boto.support.connect_to_region('us-west-2')
In either case, conn
points to a SupportConnection
object which we will
use throughout the remainder of this tutorial.
Describing Existing Cases¶
If you have existing cases or want to fetch cases in the future, you’ll
use the SupportConnection.describe_cases
method. For example:
>>> cases = conn.describe_cases()
>>> len(cases['cases'])
1
>>> cases['cases'][0]['title']
'A test case.'
>>> cases['cases'][0]['caseId']
'case-...'
You can also fetch a set of cases (or single case) by providing a
case_id_list
parameter:
>>> cases = conn.describe_cases(case_id_list=['case-1'])
>>> len(cases['cases'])
1
>>> cases['cases'][0]['title']
'A test case.'
>>> cases['cases'][0]['caseId']
'case-...'
Describing Service Codes¶
In order to create a new case, you’ll need to fetch the service (& category) codes available to you. Fetching them is a simple call to:
>>> services = conn.describe_services()
>>> services['services'][0]['code']
'amazon-cloudsearch'
If you only care about certain services, you can pass a list of service codes:
>>> service_details = conn.describe_services(service_code_list=[
... 'amazon-cloudsearch',
... 'amazon-dynamodb',
... ])
Describing Severity Levels¶
In order to create a new case, you’ll also need to fetch the severity levels available to you. Fetching them looks like:
>>> severities = conn.describe_severity_levels()
>>> severities['severityLevels'][0]['code']
'low'
Creating a Case¶
Upon creating a connection to Support, you can now work with existing Support cases, create new cases or resolve them. We’ll start with creating a new case:
>>> new_case = conn.create_case(
... subject='This is a test case.',
... service_code='',
... category_code='',
... communication_body="",
... severity_code='low'
... )
>>> new_case['caseId']
'case-...'
For the service_code/category_code
parameters, you’ll need to do a
SupportConnection.describe_services
call, then select the appropriate
service code (& appropriate category code within that service) from the
response.
For the severity_code
parameter, you’ll need to do a
SupportConnection.describe_severity_levels
call, then select the appropriate
severity code from the response.
Adding to a Case¶
Since the purpose of a support case involves back-and-forth communication, you can add additional communication to the case as well. Providing a response might look like:
>>> result = conn.add_communication_to_case(
... communication_body="This is a followup. It's working now."
... case_id='case-...'
... )
Fetching all Communications for a Case¶
Getting all communications for a given case looks like:
>>> communications = conn.describe_communications('case-...')
Resolving a Case¶
Once a case is finished, you should mark it as resolved to close it out. Resolving a case looks like:
>>> closed = conn.resolve_case(case_id='case-...')
>>> closed['result']
True