=========================
XML-RPC access to Roundup
=========================

.. contents::

Introduction
------------
Version 1.4 of Roundup includes an XML-RPC frontend. Some installations find
that roundup-admins requirement of local access to the tracker instance
limiting. The XML-RPC frontend provides the ability to execute a limited subset
of commands similar to those found in roundup-admin from remote machines. 

roundup-xmlrpc-server
---------------------
The Roundup XML-RPC server must be started before remote clients can access the
tracker via XML-RPC. ``roundup-xmlrpc-server`` is installed in the scripts
directory alongside ``roundup-server`` and roundup-admin``. When invoked, the
location of the tracker instance must be specified.

	roundup-xmlrpc-server -i ``/path/to/tracker``

The default port is ``8000``. An alternative port can be specified with the
``--port`` switch.

security consideration
======================
Note that the current ``roundup-xmlrpc-server`` implementation does not
support SSL. This means that usernames and passwords will be passed in
cleartext unless the server is being proxied behind another server (such as
Apache or lighttpd) that provide SSL.

client API
----------
The server currently implements four methods. Each method requires that the
user provide a username and password in the HTTP authorization header in order
to authenticate the request against the tracker.

======= ====================================================================
Command Description
======= ====================================================================
list    arguments: *classname, [property_name]*

        List all elements of a given ``classname``. If ``property_name`` is
        specified, that is the property that will be displayed for each
        element. If ``property_name`` is not specified the default label
        property will be used.

display arguments: *designator, [property_1, ..., property_N]*

        Display a single item in the tracker as specified by ``designator``
        (e.g. issue20 or user5). The default is to display all properties
        for the item. Alternatively, a list of properties to display can be
        specified.

create  arguments: *classname, arg_1 ... arg_N*

        Create a new instance of ``classname`` with ``arg_1`` through
        ``arg_N`` as the values of the new instance. The arguments are
        name=value pairs (e.g. ``status='3'``).

set     arguments: *designator, arg_1 ... arg_N*

        Set the values of an existing item in the tracker as specified by
        ``designator``. The new values are specified in ``arg_1`` through
        ``arg_N``. The arguments are name=value pairs (e.g. ``status='3'``).
======= ====================================================================

sample python client
====================
::

        >>> import xmlrpclib
        >>> roundup_server = xmlrpclib.ServerProxy('http://username:password@localhost:8000')
        >>> roundup_server.list('user')
        ['admin', 'anonymous', 'demo']
        >>> roundup_server.list('issue', 'id')
        ['1']
        >>> roundup_server.display('issue1')
        {'assignedto' : None, 'files' : [], 'title' = 'yes, ..... }
        >>> roundup_server.display('issue1', 'priority', 'status')
        {'priority' : '1', 'status' : '2'}
        >>> roundup_server.set('issue1', 'status=3')
        >>> roundup_server.display('issue1', 'status')
        {'status' : '3' }
        >>> roundup_server.create('issue', "title='another bug'", "status=2")
        '2'