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Octopus REST API

Octopus Deploy is built API-first. This means that Octopus is built in layers; all data and operations are available over its REST API. The Octopus Web Portal is built on top of this API so all of the data and operations you can see and perform in the Octopus Web Portal can be performed over the REST API.

Octopus integrates with build servers, scripts, external applications, and anything else with its REST API.

The Octopus REST API is designed:

  1. To be friendly and easy to figure out.
  2. To be hypermedia driven, using links and the occasional URI template (read more).
  3. To be comprehensive - 100% of the actions that you perform via the Octopus UI can be performed via the API.
  4. To provide a great developer experience through API clients and detailed examples.

API clients

Octopus provides API clients for popular programming languages and runtime environments. The source code for these clients is hosted on GitHub:

Code snippets using these clients for various operations in the Octopus REST API are available in our API examples documentation.

REST API authentication

The Octopus Deploy API is available at:

https://<your-octopus-url>/api

Replacing <your-octopus-url> with the URL that you host your Octopus instance on.

The API supports two methods of authentication.

API Key

You can get your API key from your profile page on the Octopus Web Portal.

Once you have a key, you can provide it to the API in the following ways:

  1. Through the X-Octopus-ApiKey HTTP header with all requests. This is the preferred approach.
  2. As an apikey query string parameter with all requests. This should only be used for simple requests.

Learn more about how to create an API key.

OpenID Connect

Octopus supports using OpenID Connect (OIDC) for service accounts to obtain an access token which can then be used to authenticate API requests.

Any issuer that can generate signed OIDC tokens which can be validated anonymously is supported, however first-class support for GitHub Actions is provided with the OctopusDeploy/login action.

For more information see Using OpenId Connect with the Octopus API.

REST API Swagger documentation

Octopus includes the default Swagger UI for displaying the API documentation in a nice human readable way. To browse that UI just open your browser and go to https://<your-octopus-url>/swaggerui/. The original Non-Swagger API page is still available and can always be accessed via https://<your-octopus-url>/api/.

Server API

You can view the API through the Octopus Demo server at demo.octopus.app/swaggerui/index.html.

All resources returned by the REST API contain links to other resources. The idea is that instead of memorizing or hard-coding URL’s when using the API, you should start with the root API resource and use links to navigate.

For example, a GET request to /api returns a resource that looks like:

{
  "Application": "Octopus Deploy",
  "Version": "2022.1.2386",
  "ApiVersion": "3.0.0",
  "InstallationId": "9f155416-5d9e-4e19-ba58-b710d4edf336",
  "Links": {
    "Self": "/api",
    "Accounts": "/api/Spaces-1/accounts{/id}{?skip,take,ids,partialName,accountType}",
    "Environments": "/api/Spaces-1/environments{/id}{?name,skip,ids,take,partialName}",
    "Machines": "/api/Spaces-1/machines{/id}{?skip,take,name,ids,partialName,roles,isDisabled,healthStatuses,commStyles,tenantIds,tenantTags,environmentIds,thumbprint,deploymentId,shellNames,deploymentTargetTypes}",
    "Projects": "/api/Spaces-1/projects{/id}{?name,skip,ids,clone,take,partialName,clonedFromProjectId}",
    "RunbookProcesses": "/api/Spaces-1/runbookProcesses{/id}{?skip,take,ids}",
    "RunbookRuns": "/api/Spaces-1/runbookRuns{/id}{?skip,take,ids,projects,environments,tenants,runbooks,taskState,partialName}",
    "Runbooks": "/api/Spaces-1/runbooks{/id}{?skip,take,ids,partialName,clone,projectIds}",
    "RunbookSnapshots": "/api/Spaces-1/runbookSnapshots{/id}{?skip,take,ids,publish}",
    "Feeds": "/api/feeds{/id}{?skip,take,ids,partialName,feedType,name}",
    "Tasks": "/api/tasks{/id}{?skip,active,environment,tenant,runbook,project,name,node,running,states,hasPendingInterruptions,hasWarningsOrErrors,take,ids,partialName,spaces,includeSystem,description,fromCompletedDate,toCompletedDate,fromQueueDate,toQueueDate,fromStartDate,toStartDate}",
    "Variables": "/api/Spaces-1/variables{/id}{?ids}",
    "Web": "/app"
  }
}

Note: the Links collection example above has been significantly reduced in size for demonstration purposes.

You can follow the links in the result to navigate around the API; for example, by following the Projects link, you’ll find a list of the projects on your Octopus server.

Since the format and structure of links may change, it’s essential that clients avoid hardcoding URL’s to resources, and instead rely on starting at /api and navigating from there.

URI templates

Some links (mainly to collections) use URI templates as defined in RFC 6570. If in doubt, a client should assume that any link is a URI template.

Collections

Collections of resources also include links. For example, following the Environments link above will give you a list of environments.

{
  "ItemType": "Environment",
  "TotalResults": 20,
  "ItemsPerPage": 10,
  "NumberOfPages": 2,
  "LastPageNumber": 1,
  "Items": [
    // ... a list of environments ...
  ],
  "Links": {
    "Self": "/api/Spaces-1/environments?skip=0&take=10",
    "Template": "/api/Spaces-1/environments{?skip,ids,take,partialName}",
    "Page.All": "/api/Spaces-1/environments?skip=0&take=2147483647",
    "Page.Next": "/api/Spaces-1/environments?skip=10&take=10",
    "Page.Current": "/api/Spaces-1/environments?skip=0&take=10"
  }
}

The links at the bottom of the resource allow you to traverse the pages of results. Again, instead of hard-coding query string parameters, you can look for a Page.Next link and follow that instead.

REST API and Spaces

If you are using spaces, you need to include the SpaceID in your API calls. If you do not include the SpaceID, your API calls will automatically use the default space.

REST API code samples

Code snippet samples for various operations in the Octopus REST API are available both in our API examples and on the OctopusDeploy-API GitHub repository

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Page updated on Wednesday, October 4, 2023

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