Python Object Paths

The object classes used in the SDK directly correspond to the REST endpoints you’d use to access the objects via the API. Remembering the patterns below will help you easily derive an SDK object class from an object URI.

1. Objects take the form f5.<product>.<organizing_collection>.<collection>.<resource>.<subcollection>.<resource>.
2. The collection and the resource generally have the same name, so the collection is the plural version of the resource. This means that you add s to the end of the resource to get the collection, unless the resource already ends in s. If the resource is already plural, add _s to get the collection.
3. The object itself is accessed by its CamelCase name, but the usage of the object is all lowercase.
4. The characters . and - are always replaced with _ in the SDK.

Because the REST API endpoints have a hierarchical structure, you need to load/create the highest-level objects before you can load lower-level ones. The example below shows how the pieces of the URI correspond to the REST endpoints/SDK classes. The first part of the URI is the IP address of your BIG-IP®.

http://192.168.1.1/mgmt/tm/ltm/pool/~Common~mypool/members/~Common~m1:80
                  |----|--|---|----|--------------|-------|-------------|
                  |root|OC|OC |Coll| Resource     | SC    |SubColl Resrc|

OC	Organizing Collection
Coll	Collection
Resource	Resource
SC	Subcollection
SubColl Resrc	Subcollection Resource

In the sections below, we’ll walk through the Python object paths using LTM® pools and pool members as examples. You can also skip straight to the Coding Example.

Organizing Collection

The tm and ltm organizing collections define what area of the BIG-IP® you’re going to work with. The tm organizing collection corresponds to the traffic management plane of your BIG-IP® (tmsh). Loading ltm indicates that we’re going to work with the BIG-IP®’s Local Traffic module.

Endpoint	http://192.168.1.1/mgmt/tm/
Kind	tm:restgroupresolverviewstate
Type	organizing collection
Class	f5.bigip.tm.Tm
Instantiation	tm = mgmt.tm

Endpoint	http://192.168.1.1/mgmt/tm/ltm
Kind	tm:ltm:collectionstate
Type	organizing collection
Class	f5.bigip.tm.ltm.Ltm
Instantiation	ltm = mgmt.tm.ltm

Example: Connect to the BIG-IP® and load the ltm organizing collection

from f5.bigip import ManagementRoot
mgmt = ManagementRoot('192.168.1.1', 'myuser', 'mypass')
ltm = mgmt.tm.ltm

>>> print mgmt
<f5.bigip.ManagementRoot object at 0x1044e3210>

>>> print ltm
<f5.bigip.tm.ltm.Ltm object at 0x104aee7d0>

Collection

Now that the higher-level organizing collections are loaded (in other words, we signed in to the BIG-IP® and accessed the LTM® module), we can load the pool collection.

Endpoint	http://192.168.1.1/mgmt/tm/ltm/pool
Kind	tm:ltm:pool:poolcollectionstate
Type	collection
Class	f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Pools
Instantiation	pools = mgmt.tm.ltm.pools

Example: Load the pools collection

pool_collection = mgmt.tm.ltm.pools.get_collection()
pools = mgmt.tm.ltm.pools

for pool in pool_collection:
     print pool.name

pool1
pool2

In the above example, we used the f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Pools.get_collection() method to fetch the collection (in other words, a list of the pool resources configured on the BIG-IP®). Then, we instantiated the class f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Pools.

Resource

In the SDK, we refer to a single instance of a configuration object as a resource. As shown in the previous sections, we are able to access the pool resources on the BIG-IP® after loading the /mgmt/tm/ltm/ organizing collections and the pools collection.

Endpoint	http://192.168.1.1/mgmt/tm/ltm/pool/~Common~mypool/
Kind	tm:ltm:pool:poolstate
Type	resource
Class	f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Pool
Instantiation	pool = mgmt.tm.ltm.pools.pool.load(partition='<partition_name>', name='<pool_name>')

Example: Load a pool resource

pool = pools.pool
pool1 = pool.load(partition='Common', name='pool1')

In the example above, we instantiated the class f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Pool and used it to load the f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pools.pool object. The object is a python representation of an actual BIG-IP® pool in the Common partition (or, Common/pool1).

Tip

You can always see the representation of an object using the raw() method.

>>> pool1.raw
{
    u'generation': 208,
    u'minActiveMembers': 0,
    u'ipTosToServer': u'pass-through',
    u'loadBalancingMode': u'round-robin',
    u'allowNat': u'yes',
    u'queueDepthLimit': 0,
    u'membersReference': {
        u'isSubcollection': True,
        u'link': u'https://localhost/mgmt/tm/ltm/pool/~Common~pool1/members?ver=11.6.0'},
    u'minUpMembers': 0,
    u'slowRampTime': 10,
    u'minUpMembersAction': u'failover',
    '_meta_data': {
        'attribute_registry': {
            'tm:ltm:pool:memberscollectionstate': <class 'f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Members_s'>
            },
        'container': <f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Pools object at 0x102e6c550>,
        'exclusive_attributes': [],
        'read_only_attributes': [],
        'allowed_lazy_attributes': [<class 'f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Members_s'>],
        'uri': u'https://10.190.7.161:443/mgmt/tm/ltm/pool/~Common~pool1/',
        'required_json_kind': 'tm:ltm:pool:poolstate',
        'bigip': <f5.bigip.ManagementRoot object at 0x1006e4bd0>,
        'icontrol_version': '',
        'icr_session': <icontrol.session.iControlRESTSession object at 0x1006e4c90>,
        'required_load_parameters': set(['name']),
        'required_creation_parameters': set(['name']),
        'creation_uri_frag': '',
        'creation_uri_qargs': {
            u'ver': [u'11.6.0']
        }
    },
    u'minUpMembersChecking': u'disabled',
    u'queueTimeLimit': 0,
    u'linkQosToServer': u'pass-through',
    u'description': u'This is my pool',
    u'queueOnConnectionLimit': u'disabled',
    u'fullPath': u'/Common/pool1',
    u'kind': u'tm:ltm:pool:poolstate',
    u'name': u'pool1',
    u'partition': u'Common',
    u'allowSnat': u'yes',
    u'ipTosToClient': u'pass-through',
    u'reselectTries': 0,
    u'selfLink': u'https://localhost/mgmt/tm/ltm/pool/~Common~pool1?ver=11.6.0',
    u'serviceDownAction': u'none',
    u'ignorePersistedWeight': u'disabled',
    u'linkQosToClient': u'pass-through'
}

Subcollection

A subcollection is a collection of resources that can only be accessed via its parent resource. To continue our example:

The f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Pool resource object contains f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Members subcollection resource objects. These subcollection resources – the real-servers that are attached to the pool, or ‘pool members’ – are part of the members_s subcollection in the SDK. (Remember, we have to add _s to the end of collection object names if the name of the resource object it contains already ends in s).

Endpoint	http://192.168.1.1/mgmt/tm/ltm/pool/~Common~mypool/members
Kind	tm:ltm:pool:members:memberscollectionstate
Type	subcollection
Class	f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Members_s
Instantiation	members = mgmt.tm.ltm.pools.pool.members_s

Example: Load the members_s collection to view a list of members

members_collection = pool.members_s.get_collection()
members = pool.members_s

print members_collection
[<f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Members object at 0x9d7ff0>, <f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Members object at 0x9d7830>]

Subcollection Resource

As explained in the previous section, a subcollection contains subcollection resources. These subcollection resources can only be loaded after all of the parent objects (organizing collections, resource, and subcollection) have been loaded.

Endpoint	http://192.168.1.1/mgmt/tm/ltm/pool/~Common~mypool/members/~Common~member1
Kind	tm:ltm:pool:members:membersstate
Type	subcollection resource
Class	f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Members
Instantiation	member = mgmt.tm.ltm.pool.members_s.members.load(partition='<partition_name>', name='<member_name>:<port>')

Example: Load members objects

members = pool.members_s
member = pool.members_s.members
print member
<f5.bigip.tm.ltm.pool.Members object at 0x9fd530>

Coding Example