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Working with a private Swift container

Prerequisites

In order to create a Swift container, be sure that you have installed and configured the required command-line interface (CLI) tools.

Creating a private container

To create a private container (that is, one that can only be accessed with proper Swift API credentials), use the following command:

$ openstack container create private-container
+---------------------------------------+-------------------+----------------------------------------------------+
| account                               | container         | x-trans-id                                         |
+---------------------------------------+-------------------+----------------------------------------------------+
| AUTH_30a7768a0ffc40359d6110f21a6e7d88 | private-container | tx00000ddb0f9e2a50ad881-00638dbf9c-300de11-default |
+---------------------------------------+-------------------+----------------------------------------------------+


swift post private-container
This command produces no output.

Retrieving container information

To create a list of all containers accessible with your current set of credentials, use this command:

$ openstack container list
+-------------------+
| Name              |
+-------------------+
| private-container |
+-------------------+

$ swift list
private-container

To retrieve more detailed information about an individual container, you can also use this command:

$ openstack container show private-container
+----------------+---------------------------------------+
| Field          | Value                                 |
+----------------+---------------------------------------+
| account        | AUTH_30a7768a0ffc40359d6110f21a6e7d88 |
| bytes_used     | 0                                     |
| container      | private-container                     |
| object_count   | 0                                     |
| storage_policy | default-placement                     |
+----------------+---------------------------------------+

$ swift stat private-container
                      Account: AUTH_30a7768a0ffc40359d6110f21a6e7d88
                    Container: private-container
                      Objects: 0
                        Bytes: 0
                     Read ACL:
                    Write ACL:
                      Sync To:
                     Sync Key:
                  X-Timestamp: 1670234012.31534
X-Container-Bytes-Used-Actual: 0
             X-Storage-Policy: default-placement
              X-Storage-Class: STANDARD
                Last-Modified: Mon, 05 Dec 2022 09:53:32 GMT
                   X-Trans-Id: tx0000073eebb42acd6e7e1-00638dbfe8-301ddeb-default
       X-Openstack-Request-Id: tx0000073eebb42acd6e7e1-00638dbfe8-301ddeb-default
                Accept-Ranges: bytes
                 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8

Uploading data

To upload an object into the container, create a local test file:

echo "hello world" > testobj.txt

Then, upload the file (as a Swift object) into your container, and read back its metadata:

$ openstack object create private-container testobj.txt
+-------------+-------------------+----------------------------------+
| object      | container         | etag                             |
+-------------+-------------------+----------------------------------+
| testobj.txt | private-container | 6f5902ac237024bdd0c176cb93063dc4 |
+-------------+-------------------+----------------------------------+

$ openstack object show private-container testobj.txt
+----------------+---------------------------------------+
| Field          | Value                                 |
+----------------+---------------------------------------+
| account        | AUTH_30a7768a0ffc40359d6110f21a6e7d88 |
| container      | private-container                     |
| content-length | 12                                    |
| content-type   | text/plain                            |
| etag           | 6f5902ac237024bdd0c176cb93063dc4      |
| last-modified  | Mon, 05 Dec 2022 10:00:34 GMT         |
| object         | testobj.txt                           |
| properties     | mtime='1670234292.370177'             |
+----------------+---------------------------------------+

$ swift upload private-container testobj.txt
testobj.txt

$ swift stat private-container testobj.txt
               Account: AUTH_30a7768a0ffc40359d6110f21a6e7d88
             Container: private-container
                Object: testobj.txt
          Content Type: text/plain
        Content Length: 12
         Last Modified: Mon, 05 Dec 2022 10:00:34 GMT
                  ETag: 6f5902ac237024bdd0c176cb93063dc4
            Meta Mtime: 1670234292.370177
         Accept-Ranges: bytes
           X-Timestamp: 1670234434.67877
            X-Trans-Id: tx000000f26ccf73c19f596-00638dc160-300de11-default
X-Openstack-Request-Id: tx000000f26ccf73c19f596-00638dc160-300de11-default

Downloading data

To download an object from your Swift container, use the following command:

$ openstack object save --file - private-container testobj.txt
hello world
The --file - option prints the file contents to stdout. If instead you want to save the object’s content to a local file, use --file <filename>.

If you omit the --file argument altogether, openstack object save will create a local file named like the object you are downloading (in this case, testobj.txt).

$ swift download -o - private-container testobj.txt
hello world
The -o - option prints the file contents to stdout. If instead you want to save the object’s content to a local file, use -o <filename>.

If you omit the -o argument altogether, swift download will create a local file named like the object you are downloading (in this case, testobj.txt).