[arin-tech-discuss] Restful web service for Swipping

[Tim Christensen]

On 6/9/11 8:29 AM, "Grimes, Ronald" <Ron.Grimes at qwest.com> said:

> I went through the document and saw the following on page 22 (in attachment).
> These are some of the details we are looking for.  We are not seeing error
> messages like this come back in production.  Do you know if this is currently
> working? 

Yes. These messages appear in the Error Payload that is returned in the
*body* of the HTTP Response.  For example, I tried to perform a GET on a POC
record to which a bogus API key does not have access (e.g., would produce an
authentication failure) by issuing a GET such as:

http://www.arin.net/rest/poc/ARIN-HOSTMASTER?apikey=API-BOGUS

And received an HTTP response of "400 Bad Request", containing the following
Error Payload in the HTTP body:

<error xmlns="http://www.arin.net/regrws/core/v1">
    <additionalInfo/>
    <code>E_AUTHENTICATION</code>
    <components/>
    <message>The API key specified was missing or invalid.</message>
</error>
 
> Do you know if there are any plans to make these error messages more specific?

These messages are intended to provide a categorical indication of the
problem.  The reason for the specific error is informed by examining the
specific URI, inbound payload, and comparison to the published XML schemas
that are available in the same location where you found the Methods and
Payloads documents.

> Do you know how long it will be before these documents will be updated to be
> more user friendly?

One focus of the document update is to address this particular issue: how to
contextually correlate an error using the Payload, XML Schema, and other
documentation so that you can understand and resolve errors readily.
Revising the document is an active work item right now, but must also go
thru publishing and approval.  In the meantime, you may continue to ask
questions here on ARIN-Tech-Discuss.  Please know that your questions and
feedback are very valuable: they indicate to us what areas of the
documentation need to be improved or refined.

Best regards,
Tim Christensen
ARIN Engineering