Next Generation SSIS Tasks and data Connection Series REST API File Upload using SSIS Next Generation SSIS Tasks and data Connection Series

REST API Content Learn how to perform REST API File Upload using SQL Server Integration Services (SSIS) Understanding REST API Multipart Upload / File Upload Rest API File Upload Conclusion Keywords

Introduction In this post you will learn how to use the SSIS REST API Task to perform REST API File Upload (i.e. RESTful file upload) to web server. Typically to access REST API you may have to use programming language but in this post we will use visual drag and drop approach. File upload using HTTP/HTTPS protocol sometimes also known as multipart/form-data POST. Many REST APIs support for file upload using HTTP methods such as POST or PUT. Real-world scenarios: Uploading Image/media to Twitter or Facebook Import Marketo Lead files using REST API

How to do REST API File Upload using SSIS 1.Download and install SSIS REST API Task 2.From toolbox of the SSIS designer drag ZS SSIS REST API Task 3.Double click REST API Task to configure it 4.Specify URL where you wish to POST file/other data Example : http://myserver/api/v1/uploaddata 5.Select HTTP Request Method as POST ( make sure your API Documentation for this. Sometimes its PUT rather POST) 6.Check File Upload option next to Body text box !!!!This is the most important so don’t forget !!!!

How to do REST API File Upload using SSIS 7.Now click edit button next to Body text box. You may specify files / fields you wish to submit along with your request in the following format. Its key/value pair separated by new line. Each key/value pair has to be separated with equal sign (=).NOTE: Any value starting with at symbol (@) is treated as File Path. If you don’t want that behavior then use slash also known as escape sequence (e.g. Somefield3StartsWithAt=\@MyTwitterHandle). You can do same thing to add new line character in your value. use \r\n for new line. use \t for tabAlso notice name of field can be anything unless your API expects in certain way. Example: Twitter Image Upload API may expect your image file as media field in that case you would write ….  media=@c:\data\someimage.png …. rather than File1=@c:\data\someimage.png File1=@c:\data\somedata.txt File2=@c:\data\someimage.png Somefield1=abcdef Somefield2=123456 Extrafield3WithNewLine=This is line1\r\nThis is line2 with tab\t and more \t tab Somefield3StartsWithAt=\@MyTwitterHandle Click OK to save above

Understanding Multipart Upload / File Upload Now lets take a look how does it look like in Fiddler when actual Multipart POST request is made for REST API File upload. Notice each field included in out HTTP POST request is separated by some random boundary. This boundary is automatically generated by REST API Task. If you post Image then you will see binary data rather than textfor file content. Understanding Multipart Upload / File Upload

Conclusion If you have need to perform REST API File Upload / REST API integration without learning complex APIs and programming languages (e.g. Python, JAVA, C#) then SSIS REST API Task provides perfect way to do REST API integration with your existing system. You can uncover endless possibilities with drag and drop approach which is not only simple to use but includes many options for complex scenarios too.

Keywords How to perform rest api file upload | How to do RESTful file upload in C# | How to do multipart file upload without cURL | How to upload multiple files using http multi part forms | Rest Client Upload File | C# REST API Upload File | Rest API Upload Image | Rest API Upload File