Python web services client examples

  • Release version: Yokohama
  • Updated January 30, 2025
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    Summary of Python web services client examples

    This content provides practical Python examples demonstrating integration with ServiceNow web services using SOAP. It guides ServiceNow customers through common tasks such as creating incidents, querying records, and handling advanced event-driven workflows by interacting with ServiceNow's SOAP API via the SOAPpy library.

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    Requirements

    • Python modules required: fpconst, PyXML, and SOAPpy.
    • Use HTTPS URLs formatted as https://INSTANCE.service-now.com rather than using www in the URL.

    Key Examples

    • Insert Incident: Shows how to create a new incident record by calling the insert method on the incident table with parameters such as impact, urgency, priority, category, user, assignment group, and description. This example uses basic authentication and SOAPpy's SOAPProxy.
    • Get Keys: Demonstrates retrieving sysid values of incident records filtered by category, useful for identifying records matching criteria.
    • Get Records: Illustrates fetching full incident records filtered by a specified field (e.g., category), enabling retrieval of detailed incident information.
    • Get Record by sysid: Shows how to retrieve a specific incident record by providing its unique sysid, enabling precise record access.
    • Advanced ECC Queue Integration: Provides a more complex script that monitors a log file for specific keywords, and upon matches, creates ECC queue records in ServiceNow with XML payloads. This example highlights how to automate alert creation based on external system logs using the SOAP API.

    Practical Considerations for ServiceNow Customers

    • Always use the correct HTTPS endpoint format to avoid connection issues.
    • Basic authentication with username and password is used; ensure credentials are properly managed and secured.
    • SOAPpy enables direct SOAP API consumption from Python, suitable for legacy SOAP integrations.
    • Debugging output can be enabled in the SOAPProxy configuration for troubleshooting SOAP request/response details.
    • Advanced examples demonstrate how to extend ServiceNow integration beyond simple CRUD operations to event-driven use cases involving ECC queue processing.

    Expected Outcomes

    By applying these Python examples, ServiceNow customers can efficiently automate the creation, retrieval, and monitoring of incident records through SOAP web services. Additionally, they can build custom automated workflows that respond to external system events by leveraging the ECC queue, enhancing operational automation capabilities.

    Examples demonstrating an integration with a Python web services client.

    Requirements

    The following examples require the installation of the following Python modules:

    insert

    This is an example of inserting an incident.
    #!/usr/bin/python
 
 from SOAPpy  import SOAPProxy
 import sys
 
 def createincident (params_dict ):
 
         # instance to send to
        instance = 'demo'
 
         # username/password
        username = 'itil'
        password = 'itil'
 
 
         # proxy - NOTE: ALWAYS use https://INSTANCE.service-now.com, not https://www.service-now.com/INSTANCE for web services URL from now on!
        proxy  = 'https://%s:%s@%s.service-now.com/incident.do?SOAP' %  (username , password , instance )
        namespace  = 'http://www.service-now.com/'
        server  = SOAPProxy (proxy , namespace )
 
         # uncomment these for LOTS of debugging output #server.config.dumpHeadersIn = 1 #server.config.dumpHeadersOut = 1 #server.config.dumpSOAPOut = 1 #server.config.dumpSOAPIn = 1
 
        response  = server. insert (impact = int (params_dict [ 'impact' ] ) , urgency = int (params_dict [ 'urgency' ] ) , priority = int (params_dict [ 'priority' ] ) , category =params_dict [ 'category' ] , location =params_dict [ 'location' ] , caller_id =params_dict [ 'user' ] , assignment_group =params_dict [ 'assignment_group' ] , assigned_to =params_dict [ 'assigned_to' ] , short_description =params_dict [ 'short_description' ] , comments =params_dict [ 'comments' ] )
 
         return response
 
values  = { 'impact':  '1' , 'urgency':  '1' , 'priority':  '1' , 'category':  'High' , 'location':  'San Diego' , 'user':  'fred.luddy@yourcompany.com' , 'assignment_group':  'Technical Support' , 'assigned_to':  'David Loo' , 'short_description':  'An incident created using python, SOAPpy, and web services.' , 'comments':  'This a test making an incident with python.\n Isn \' t life wonderful?' }
 
new_incident_sysid =createincident (values )
 
 print "Returned sysid: "+ repr (new_incident_sysid )

    getKeys

    This is an example of executing getKeys on the demo instance using basic authentication.
    #!/bin/env python
 
 # use the SOAPpy module from SOAPpy  import SOAPProxy
 
username , password , instance  = 'admin' , 'admin' , 'demo'
proxy , namespace  = 'https://username:password@www.service-now.com/'+instance+ '/incident.do?SOAP' , 'http://www.service-now.com/'
 
server  = SOAPProxy (proxy ,namespace )
response  = server. getKeys (category  = 'Network' )
 
 print response. sys_id. split ( ',' )

    getRecords

    In this example, we get an incident, querying for category == "Network" (with basic authentication).
    #!/bin/env python
 
 # use the SOAPpy module from SOAPpy  import SOAPProxy
 
username , password , instance  = 'admin' , 'admin' , 'demo'
proxy , namespace  = 'https://username:password@www.service-now.com/'+instance+ '/incident.do?SOAP' , 'http://www.service-now.com/'
 
server  = SOAPProxy (proxy ,namespace )
response  = server. getRecords (category  = 'Network' )
 
 for record  in response:
	 for item  in record:
		 print item

    get

    In this example, we get an incident record by sys_id (with basic authentication).
    #!/bin/env python
 
 # use the SOAPpy module from SOAPpy  import SOAPProxy
 
username , password , instance  = 'admin' , 'admin' , 'demo'
proxy , namespace  = 'https://username:password@www.service-now.com/'+instance+ '/incident.do?SOAP' , 'http://www.service-now.com/'
 
server  = SOAPProxy (proxy ,namespace )
response  = server. get (sys_id  = '9c573169c611228700193229fff72400' )
 
 for each  in response:
	 print each

    Advanced

    This is an example of advanced Python script that reads a log file for a keyword invalid spi and creates an ECC Queue record where the payload is set to an alert of XML format.
    #!/bin/env python
 
 # kevin.pickard@service-now.com			2008.07.03		initial creation
 
 from SOAPpy  import SOAPProxy
 from xml. dom. minidom import getDOMImplementation
 import sys , os , socket , pickle , re
 
 # instance to send to
instance = 'demo'
 
 # username/pass
username = 'admin'
password = 'admin'
 
 # log file to watch
syslogfile = '/var/log/cisco.log.ksp'
 
 # state file
statefile = '/tmp/syslog_ecc.state-test'
 
 # ECC queue values
soapagent = 'SOAPpy'
ecctopic = 'PIX Error: '
eccname = 'Invalid SPI: '
eccsource = 'Syslog'
 
 # regex string to match
matchstring = 'invalid spi'
 
 try:
	state = open (statefile , 'r' )
	lastbyte = pickle. load (state )
	state. close ( ) except:
	lastbyte = 0
 
 #print 'DEBUG: lastbyte = '+str(lastbyte)
 
 try:
	log = open (syslogfile , 'ro' ) except:
	errortopic = 'Script Error'
	errorname = 'Unable to open log file '+syslogfile+ '.'
	errorpayload = 'This message was generated due to an error condition encountered in a script.  The name of the script is '+ os. path. basename ( sys. argv [ 0 ] )+ ' on server '+ socket. gethostname ( )+ '.'
 
	proxy  = 'https://'+username+ ':'+password+ '@'+instance+ '.service-now.com/ecc_queue.do?SOAP'
	namespace  = 'http://www.service-now.com/'
	server  = SOAPProxy (proxy , namespace )
	server. config. dumpSOAPOut = 1 
	server. config. dumpSOAPIn = 1 
        response  = server. insert (agent =soapagent , topic =errortopic , name =errorname , source = sys. argv [ 0 ] , payload =errorpayload )
 
	 sys. exit ( 1 )
 
 if lastbyte  != 0:
	 try:
		log. seek (lastbyte ) except IOError:
		 pass
 
loglines =log. readlines ( )
 
lastbyte =log. tell ( )
 
log. close ( )
 
state = open (statefile , 'w' ) pickle. dump (lastbyte , state )
state. close ( )
 
 # regex out the line
matchedlines = [ ] for line  in loglines:
	 if re. search (matchstring , line ) != None:
		matchedlines. append (line )
 
 #print 'DEBUG: len->loglines = '+str(len(loglines)) #print 'DEBUG: lastbyte = '+str(lastbyte) #print 'DEBUG: matchedlines = '+str(matchedlines)
 
 if len (matchedlines ) == 0:
	 sys. exit ( 0 )
 
proxy  = 'https://'+username+ ':'+password+ '@'+instance+ '.service-now.com/ecc_queue.do?SOAP'
namespace  = 'http://www.service-now.com/'
 
server  = SOAPProxy (proxy , namespace ) #server.config.dumpSOAPOut = 1 #server.config.dumpSOAPIn = 1
 
entriestosend = { } for line  in matchedlines:
	device =line. split ( ) [ 3 ]
	sourceip =line. split ( ) [- 1 ]
	entriestosend [sourceip ] = [device , line ]
 
 for key ,value  in entriestosend. iteritems ( ):
	 #impl=getDOMImplementation() #newdoc = impl.createDocument(None, "log_line", None) #top_element = newdoc.documentElement #text = newdoc.createTextNode(value[1]) #top_element.appendChild(text)
 
	response  = server. insert (agent =soapagent , topic =ecctopic+value [ 0 ] , name =eccname+key , source =eccsource , payload =value [ 1 ] )