Web activity in Azure Data Factory and Azure Synapse Analytics

APPLIES TO: Azure Data Factory Azure Synapse Analytics

Web Activity can be used to call a custom REST endpoint from an Azure Data Factory or Synapse pipeline. You can pass datasets and linked services to be consumed and accessed by the activity.

Create a Web activity with UI

To use a Web activity in a pipeline, complete the following steps:

1. Search for Web in the pipeline Activities pane, and drag a Web activity to the pipeline canvas.

2. Select the new Web activity on the canvas if it is not already selected, and its Settings tab, to edit its details.

   

3. Specify a URL, which can be a literal URL string, or any combination of dynamic expressions, functions, system variables, or outputs from other activities. Provide other details to be submitted with the request.

4. Use the output from the activity as the input to any other activity, and reference the output anywhere dynamic content is supported in the destination activity.

Syntax

{
   "name":"MyWebActivity",
   "type":"WebActivity",
   "typeProperties":{
      "method":"Post",
      "url":"<URLEndpoint>",
      "httpRequestTimeout": "00:01:00"
      "connectVia": {
          "referenceName": "<integrationRuntimeName>",
          "type": "IntegrationRuntimeReference"
      }
      "headers":{
         "Content-Type":"application/json"
      },
      "authentication":{
         "type":"ClientCertificate",
         "pfx":"****",
         "password":"****"
      },
      "datasets":[
         {
            "referenceName":"<ConsumedDatasetName>",
            "type":"DatasetReference",
            "parameters":{
               ...
            }
         }
      ],
      "linkedServices":[
         {
            "referenceName":"<ConsumedLinkedServiceName>",
            "type":"LinkedServiceReference"
         }
      ]
   }
}

Type properties

Property	Description	Allowed values	Required
name	Name of the web activity	String	Yes
type	Must be set to WebActivity.	String	Yes
method	REST API method for the target endpoint.	String. Supported Types: "GET", "POST", "PUT", "PATCH", "DELETE"	Yes
url	Target endpoint and path	String (or expression with resultType of string). The activity will time out at 1 minute with an error if it does not receive a response from the endpoint. You can increase this response timeout up to 10 mins by updating the httpRequestTimeout property	Yes
httpRequestTimeout	Response timeout duration	hh:mm:ss with the max value as 00:10:00. If not explicitly specified defaults to 00:01:00	No
headers	Headers that are sent to the request. For example, to set the language and type on a request: "headers" : { "Accept-Language": "en-us", "Content-Type": "application/json" }.	String (or expression with resultType of string)	No
body	Represents the payload that is sent to the endpoint.	String (or expression with resultType of string). See the schema of the request payload in Request payload schema section.	Required for POST/PUT/PATCH methods. Optional for DELETE method.
authentication	Authentication method used for calling the endpoint. Supported Types are "Basic, Client Certificate, System-assigned Managed Identity, User-assigned Managed Identity, Service Principal." For more information, see Authentication section. If authentication is not required, exclude this property.	String (or expression with resultType of string)	No
turnOffAsync	Option to disable invoking HTTP GET on location field in the response header of an HTTP 202 Response. If set true, it stops invoking HTTP GET on http location given in response header. If set false then it continues to invoke HTTP GET call on location given in http response headers.	Allowed values are false (default) and true.	No
disableCertValidation	Removes server side certificate validation (not recommended unless you are connecting to a trusted server that does not use a standard CA cert).	Allowed values are false (default) and true.	No
datasets	List of datasets passed to the endpoint.	Array of dataset references. Can be an empty array.	Yes
linkedServices	List of linked services passed to endpoint.	Array of linked service references. Can be an empty array.	Yes
connectVia	The integration runtime to be used to connect to the data store. You can use the Azure integration runtime or the self-hosted integration runtime (if your data store is in a private network). If this property isn't specified, the service uses the default Azure integration runtime.	The integration runtime reference.	No

The following table shows the requirements for JSON content:

Value type	Request body	Response body
JSON object	Supported	Supported
JSON array	Supported (At present, JSON arrays don't work as a result of a bug. A fix is in progress.)	Unsupported
JSON value	Supported	Unsupported
Non-JSON type	Unsupported	Unsupported

Authentication

Below are the supported authentication types in the web activity.

None

If authentication is not required, do not include the "authentication" property.

Basic

Specify user name and password to use with the basic authentication.

"authentication":{
   "type":"Basic",
   "username":"****",
   "password":"****"
}

Client certificate

Specify base64-encoded contents of a PFX file and the password.

"authentication":{
   "type":"ClientCertificate",
   "pfx":"****",
   "password":"****"
}

Certificate needs to be an x509 certificate. For conversion to PFX file, you can use your favorite utility. For base-64 encoding, you may use following PowerShell snippet.

$fileContentBytes = get-content 'enr.dev.webactivity.pfx' -AsByteStream

[System.Convert]::ToBase64String($fileContentBytes) | Out-File 'pfx-encoded-bytes.txt'

Managed Identity

Specify the resource uri for which the access token will be requested using the managed identity for the data factory or Synapse workspace instance. To call the Azure Resource Management API, use https://management.chinacloudapi.cn/. For more information about how managed identities works see the managed identities for Azure resources overview page.

"authentication": {
	"type": "MSI",
	"resource": "https://management.chinacloudapi.cn/"
}

Service principal

Specify the tenant ID, service principal ID, and service principal key, using a secure string for the client secret.

"authentication": {
            "type": "ServicePrincipal",
            "tenant": "your_tenant_id",
            "servicePrincipalId": "your_client_id",
            "servicePrincipalKey": {
                "type": "SecureString",
                "value": "your_client_secret"
            },
            "resource": "https://management.chinacloudapi.cn/"
}

Request payload schema

When you use the POST/PUT method, the body property represents the payload that is sent to the endpoint. You can pass linked services and datasets as part of the payload. Here is the schema for the payload:

{
    "body": {
        "myMessage": "Sample",
        "datasets": [{
            "name": "MyDataset1",
            "properties": {
                ...
            }
        }],
        "linkedServices": [{
            "name": "MyStorageLinkedService1",
            "properties": {
                ...
            }
        }]
    }
}

Example

In this example, the web activity in the pipeline calls a REST end point. It passes an Azure SQL linked service and an Azure SQL dataset to the endpoint. The REST end point uses the Azure SQL connection string to connect to the logical SQL server and returns the name of the instance of SQL server.

Pipeline definition

{
    "name": "<MyWebActivityPipeline>",
    "properties": {
        "activities": [
            {
                "name": "<MyWebActivity>",
                "type": "WebActivity",
                "typeProperties": {
                    "method": "Post",
                    "url": "@pipeline().parameters.url",
                    "headers": {
                        "Content-Type": "application/json"
                    },
                    "authentication": {
                        "type": "ClientCertificate",
                        "pfx": "*****",
                        "password": "*****"
                    },
                    "datasets": [
                        {
                            "referenceName": "MySQLDataset",
                            "type": "DatasetReference",
                            "parameters": {
                                "SqlTableName": "@pipeline().parameters.sqlTableName"
                            }
                        }
                    ],
                    "linkedServices": [
                        {
                            "referenceName": "SqlLinkedService",
                            "type": "LinkedServiceReference"
                        }
                    ]
                }
            }
        ],
        "parameters": {
            "sqlTableName": {
                "type": "String"
            },
            "url": {
                "type": "String"
            }
        }
    }
}

Pipeline parameter values

{
    "sqlTableName": "department",
    "url": "https://adftes.chinacloudsites.cn/api/execute/running"
}

Web service endpoint code

[HttpPost]
public HttpResponseMessage Execute(JObject payload)
{
    Trace.TraceInformation("Start Execute");

    JObject result = new JObject();
    result.Add("status", "complete");

    JArray datasets = payload.GetValue("datasets") as JArray;
    result.Add("sinktable", datasets[0]["properties"]["typeProperties"]["tableName"].ToString());

    JArray linkedServices = payload.GetValue("linkedServices") as JArray;
    string connString = linkedServices[0]["properties"]["typeProperties"]["connectionString"].ToString();

    System.Data.SqlClient.SqlConnection sqlConn = new System.Data.SqlClient.SqlConnection(connString);

    result.Add("sinkServer", sqlConn.DataSource);

    Trace.TraceInformation("Stop Execute");

    return this.Request.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.OK, result);
}

Related content

See other supported control flow activities:

• Execute Pipeline Activity
• For Each Activity
• Get Metadata Activity
• Lookup Activity