An entity is the target of what you are monitoring. For example, you can create an entity to monitor your website, a particular web service, or your Rackspace server or server instance. Note that an entity represents only one item in the monitoring system. For example, if you wanted to monitor each server in a cluster, you would create an entity for each of the servers. You would not create a single entity to represent the entire cluster.
An entity can have multiple checks associated with it. This allows you to check multiple services on the same host by creating multiple checks on the same entity, instead of multiple entities each with a single check.
When you create a new entity in the monitoring system, you specify the follow parameters:
A meaningful name for the entity
The IP address(es) for the entity (optional)
The meta-data that the monitoring system uses if an alarm is triggered (optional)
These parameters are further described in Attributes. See Create Entities for an example of how to create an entity.
| Name | Description | Validation |
| label | Defines a name for the entity. |
|
| agent_id | Agent to which this entity is bound to. |
|
| ip_addresses | Hash of IP addresses that can be referenced by checks on this entity. |
|
| metadata | Arbitrary key/value pairs that are passed during the alerting phase. |
|
| Verb | URI | Description | |||||
| POST | /entities | Creates a new entity. Specify the entity's characteristics using a valid set of parameters from the table shown in the Attributes section above. | |||||
Normal Response Code: (201) 'Location' header contains a link to the newly created entity.
Error Response Codes: 400, 401, 403, 500, 503
Once you have created an entity, you will typically create a check for it. See Create Check.
Example 4.9. Entity Create Request: XML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<entity>
<label>Brand New Entity</label>
<ip_addresses>
<default>127.0.0.4</default>
<b>127.0.0.5</b>
<c>127.0.0.6</c>
<test>127.0.0.7</test>
</ip_addresses>
<metadata>
<all>kinds</all>
<of>stuff</of>
<can>go</can>
<here>null is not a valid value</here>
</metadata>
</entity>
Example 4.10. Entity Create Request: JSON
{
"label": "Brand New Entity",
"ip_addresses": {
"default": "127.0.0.4",
"b": "127.0.0.5",
"c": "127.0.0.6",
"test": "127.0.0.7"
},
"metadata": {
"all": "kinds",
"of": "stuff",
"can": "go",
"here": "null is not a valid value"
}
}
| Verb | URI | Description | |||||
| GET | /entities | Lists the entities for this particular account. | |||||
There are no parameters for this call.
Normal Response Code: 200
Error Response Codes: 401, 403, 500, 503
Example 4.11. List Entities Response: XML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<container>
<values>
<entity id="enAAAAA">
<label>Brand New Entity</label>
<ip_addresses>
<default>127.0.0.4</default>
<b>127.0.0.5</b>
<c>127.0.0.6</c>
<test>127.0.0.7</test>
</ip_addresses>
<metadata>
<all>kinds</all>
<of>stuff</of>
<can>go</can>
<here>null is not a valid value</here>
</metadata>
</entity>
</values>
<metadata>
<count>1</count>
<limit>50</limit>
<marker/>
<next_marker/>
<next_href/>
</metadata>
</container>
Example 4.12. List Entities Response: JSON
{
"values": [
{
"id": "enAAAAA",
"label": "Brand New Entity",
"ip_addresses": {
"default": "127.0.0.4",
"b": "127.0.0.5",
"c": "127.0.0.6",
"test": "127.0.0.7"
},
"metadata": {
"all": "kinds",
"of": "stuff",
"can": "go",
"here": "null is not a valid value"
}
}
],
"metadata": {
"count": 1,
"limit": 50,
"marker": null,
"next_marker": null,
"next_href": null
}
}
| Verb | URI | Description | |||||
| GET | /entities/entityId |
Retrieves the current state of an entity. | |||||
This operation allows you to retrieve the current state of an entity.
Normal Response Code: 200
Error Response Codes: 401, 403, 404, 500, 503
Example 4.13. Get Entity Response: XML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<entity id="enAAAAA">
<label>Brand New Entity</label>
<ip_addresses>
<default>127.0.0.4</default>
<b>127.0.0.5</b>
<c>127.0.0.6</c>
<test>127.0.0.7</test>
</ip_addresses>
<metadata>
<all>kinds</all>
<of>stuff</of>
<can>go</can>
<here>null is not a valid value</here>
</metadata>
</entity>
Example 4.14. Get Entity Response: JSON
{
"id": "enAAAAA",
"label": "Brand New Entity",
"ip_addresses": {
"default": "127.0.0.4",
"b": "127.0.0.5",
"c": "127.0.0.6",
"test": "127.0.0.7"
},
"metadata": {
"all": "kinds",
"of": "stuff",
"can": "go",
"here": "null is not a valid value"
}
}
| Verb | URI | Description | |||||
| PUT | /entities/entityId |
Updates an entity specified by the entityId. Since partial updates to an entity are acceptable, you may specify only the parameters you would like to update. For Rackspace Managed Cloud entities, many fields will be managed by Rackspace, so only the fields 'metadata' and 'agent_id' may be updated via the API. | |||||
Normal Response Code: (204) This code contains no content with an empty response body.
Error Response Codes: 400, 401, 403, 404, 500, 503
Example 4.15. Entity Update Request: XML
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <entity> <label>Brand New Entity 2</label> </entity>
