HTTP API

HTTP API

Base URL http://127.0.0.1:7010. Interactive documentation at /docs, generated from the same definitions the server uses, so it cannot drift.

Endpoints

Method	Path	Token	Purpose
GET	/health	none	Liveness, and which warden this is
GET	/v1/pool	either	Pool size, allocated, free, reserved
GET	/v1/services	either	List registrations, filter by project and kind
POST	/v1/services	API	Register a service
GET	/v1/services/{name}	either	Look one up
POST	/v1/services/{name}/heartbeat	API	Extend a lease
DELETE	/v1/services/{name}	API	Release a port
GET	/v1/listeners	either	Every socket bound on that machine
DELETE	/v1/listeners/{pid}	API	Stop a process, off unless WARDEN_ALLOW_KILL
POST	/v1/nodes	cluster	A warden announces itself
GET	/v1/nodes	either	Every warden this one knows
DELETE	/v1/nodes/{name}	API	Forget a warden
GET	/v1/fleet/services	either	Everything the fleet holds, plus what did not answer
GET	/v1/fleet/services/{node}/{name}	either	One service on one named node
GET	/v1/update	either	Whether a newer warden exists
POST	/v1/update	either	Ask this warden to update itself
POST	/v1/fleet/update	API	Ask every warden to update itself

"API" means WARDEN_TOKEN, "cluster" means WARDEN_CLUSTER_TOKEN, "either" accepts both. A check is skipped entirely when the corresponding setting is empty. The cluster token opens announcing and reading and nothing that changes state — see Cluster.

Authorization: Bearer <token>

Registering

curl -s localhost:7010/v1/services \
  -H 'content-type: application/json' \
  -d '{"name": "shop-api", "kind": "backend", "project": "shop"}'

{
  "name": "shop-api",
  "kind": "backend",
  "project": "shop",
  "host": "127.0.0.1",
  "port": 8000,
  "pid": null,
  "meta": {},
  "ttl": null,
  "created_at": "2026-08-31T12:00:00Z",
  "updated_at": "2026-08-31T12:00:00Z",
  "expires_at": null
}

201 when the name is new, 200 when an existing registration was renewed. That difference is the only way to tell a first start from a restart.

Fields you may send:

Field	Meaning
name	Required. Unique on this warden
kind	Required. What the service is
project	Groups services of one codebase
host	Interface the service will bind to, default 127.0.0.1
preferred_port	Wish for this port, fall back to the pool
require_port	Insist on this port, 409 if it is not free
pid	Process id, shown in listings
ttl	Seconds until the registration expires
meta	Free-form string map, stored and returned untouched

Unknown fields are rejected with 422 rather than ignored, so a typo in prefered_port is a loud failure instead of a silently different port.

How a port is chosen

1. A registration that already exists keeps its port, unless another registration has taken it meanwhile.
2. require_port is granted if free, refused with 409 if not.
3. preferred_port is granted if free, and otherwise quietly gives way to the pool.
4. Otherwise the lowest free port in the pool wins.
5. Before a fresh port is handed out it is tested for an existing listener, so anything started outside the registry is skipped. A service keeping its own port is not probed, since it may still be bound to it.

Ports are tracked per host, so 10.0.0.5:8000 and 127.0.0.1:8000 are two different endpoints and may be held by two different services.

Leases

ttl makes a registration expire. POST /v1/services/{name}/heartbeat pushes the expiry out again:

curl -X POST localhost:7010/v1/services/ci-runner/heartbeat \
  -H 'content-type: application/json' -d '{"ttl": 600}'

Sent without a ttl, the heartbeat renews the lease the service registered with. It can never turn a lease into a permanent registration by accident.

Expired registrations are dropped on the next request that touches the registry, not by a timer.

Announcing a node

curl -s http://hub:7010/v1/nodes \
  -H 'content-type: application/json' \
  -H 'Authorization: Bearer <cluster token>' \
  -d '{"name": "build-01", "url": "http://build-01:7010",
       "pool_start": 9000, "pool_end": 9099, "version": "0.1.0"}'

{
  "name": "build-01",
  "url": "http://build-01:7010",
  "pool_start": 9000,
  "pool_end": 9099,
  "version": "0.1.0",
  "first_seen": "2026-08-31T12:00:00Z",
  "last_seen": "2026-08-31T12:04:00Z",
  "expires_at": "2026-08-31T12:05:30Z",
  "status": "online"
}

status is computed as you ask, not stored, so it is never out of date.

You do not normally call this by hand: a warden with WARDEN_UPSTREAM set does it for you, three times per lease.

Health

{
  "status": "ok",
  "version": "0.1.0",
  "node": "build-01",
  "role": "edge",
  "services": 2,
  "nodes": 0
}

role is edge when this warden reports to another, hub when it does not. /health never requires a token, so it works as a container or load-balancer probe.

Failures

Every refusal comes back as {"detail": "..."} with a status that says what kind of problem it is:

Status	Means
401	Missing or wrong token
403	Allowed to ask, not allowed to do — stopping processes with WARDEN_ALLOW_KILL off, or a process this account may not touch
404	No such service, node or process
409	A required port is held by someone else, or a process ignored the request to stop
422	The request body does not hold up: a bad name, an unknown field, both port wishes at once
503	The pool has no free port left

The detail is written to be shown to a person as-is:

{"detail": "port 8000 is held by 'shop-api'"}

The Python client

Everything above is wrapped, with the same errors as exceptions:

from warden import WardenClient

with WardenClient("http://hub:7010", token="...") as client:
    for node in client.nodes():
        print(node.name, node.status)

Method	Does
register(name, kind=..., ...)	Claim a port
lookup(name)	One registration
services(project=..., kind=...)	All of them
heartbeat(name, ttl=...)	Extend a lease
release(name)	Give a port back
pool()	Pool usage
listeners(udp=...)	Sockets on that machine
stop(pid, force=...)	End a process
nodes()	The fleet
announce(name, url=..., ...)	Report a node
forget(name)	Remove a node
fleet_services(project=..., kind=...)	Everything the fleet holds
fleet_lookup(node, name)	One service on one named node
session(name, ...)	Context manager that releases on exit

Exceptions all descend from WardenError: UnknownServiceError, UnknownNodeError, PortUnavailableError, PoolExhaustedError, NotPermittedError, ProtectedProcessError, StillRunningError, UnknownProcessError. A warden that cannot be reached raises the base WardenError with an explanation, not a bare connection error.