Locking

Locking#

Locking is a mechanism to prevent users from accidentally overriding each other's changes.

When a user edits a content object in Plone, the object is locked until the user hits the Save or Cancel button. If a second user tries to edit the object at the same time, she will see a message that this object is locked.

The API consumer can create, read, update, and delete a content-type lock.

Verb

URL

Action

POST

/@lock

Lock an object

GET

/@lock

Get information about the current lock

PATCH

/@lock

Refresh existing lock

DELETE

/@lock

Unlock an object

Locking an object#

To lock an object, send a POST request to the /@lock endpoint that is available on any content object in Plone:

http

POST /plone/front-page/@lock HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Authorization: Basic YWRtaW46c2VjcmV0

curl

curl -i -X POST http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock -H "Accept: application/json" --user admin:secret

httpie

http POST http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock Accept:application/json -a admin:secret

python-requests

requests.post('http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock', headers={'Accept': 'application/json'}, auth=('admin', 'secret'))

If the lock operation succeeds, the server will respond with status 200 OK and return various information about the lock, including the lock token. The token is needed in later requests to update the locked object:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "created": "1995-07-31T17:30:00+00:00",
    "creator": "admin",
    "creator_name": "admin",
    "creator_url": "http://localhost:55001/plone/author/admin",
    "locked": true,
    "name": "plone.locking.stealable",
    "stealable": true,
    "time": 807211800.0,
    "timeout": 600,
    "token": "0.684672730996-0.25195226375-00105A989226:1477076400.000"
}

By default, locks are stealable. That means that another user can unlock the object. If you want to create a non-stealable lock, pass "stealable": false in the request body.

To create a lock with a non-default timeout, you can pass the timeout value in seconds in the request body.

The following example creates a non-stealable lock with a timeout of one hour:

http

POST /plone/front-page/@lock HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Authorization: Basic YWRtaW46c2VjcmV0
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "stealable": false,
    "timeout": 3600
}

curl

curl -i -X POST http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock -H "Accept: application/json" -H "Content-Type: application/json" --data-raw '{"stealable": false, "timeout": 3600}' --user admin:secret

httpie

echo '{
  "stealable": false,
  "timeout": 3600
}' | http POST http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock Accept:application/json Content-Type:application/json -a admin:secret

python-requests

requests.post('http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock', headers={'Accept': 'application/json', 'Content-Type': 'application/json'}, json={'stealable': False, 'timeout': 3600}, auth=('admin', 'secret'))

The server responds with status 200 OK and returns the lock information:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "created": "1995-07-31T17:30:00+00:00",
    "creator": "admin",
    "creator_name": "admin",
    "creator_url": "http://localhost:55001/plone/author/admin",
    "locked": true,
    "name": "plone.locking.stealable",
    "stealable": true,
    "time": 807211800.0,
    "timeout": 3600,
    "token": "0.684672730996-0.25195226375-00105A989226:1477076400.000"
}

Unlocking an object#

To unlock an object, send a DELETE request to the /@lock endpoint:

http

DELETE /plone/front-page/@lock HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Authorization: Basic YWRtaW46c2VjcmV0

curl

curl -i -X DELETE http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock -H "Accept: application/json" --user admin:secret

httpie

http DELETE http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock Accept:application/json -a admin:secret

python-requests

requests.delete('http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock', headers={'Accept': 'application/json'}, auth=('admin', 'secret'))

The server responds with status 200 OK and returns the lock information:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "locked": false,
    "stealable": true
}

To unlock an object locked by another user, send a force DELETE request to the /@lock endpoint:

http

DELETE /plone/front-page/@lock HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Authorization: Basic YWRtaW46c2VjcmV0
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "force": true
}

curl

curl -i -X DELETE http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock -H "Accept: application/json" -H "Content-Type: application/json" --data-raw '{"force": true}' --user admin:secret

httpie

echo '{
  "force": true
}' | http DELETE http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock Accept:application/json Content-Type:application/json -a admin:secret

python-requests

requests.delete('http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock', headers={'Accept': 'application/json', 'Content-Type': 'application/json'}, json={'force': True}, auth=('admin', 'secret'))

The server responds with status 200 OK and returns the lock information:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "locked": false,
    "stealable": true
}

Refreshing a lock#

An existing lock can be refreshed by sending a PATCH request to the @lock endpoint:

http

PATCH /plone/front-page/@lock HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Authorization: Basic YWRtaW46c2VjcmV0

curl

curl -i -X PATCH http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock -H "Accept: application/json" --user admin:secret

httpie

http PATCH http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock Accept:application/json -a admin:secret

python-requests

requests.patch('http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock', headers={'Accept': 'application/json'}, auth=('admin', 'secret'))

The server responds with status 200 OK and returns the lock information containing the updated creation time:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "created": "1995-07-31T17:30:00+00:00",
    "creator": "admin",
    "creator_name": "admin",
    "creator_url": "http://localhost:55001/plone/author/admin",
    "locked": true,
    "name": "plone.locking.stealable",
    "stealable": true,
    "time": 807211800.0,
    "timeout": 600,
    "token": "0.684672730996-0.25195226375-00105A989226:1477076400.000"
}

Getting lock information#

To find out if an object is locked or to get information about the current lock, you can send a GET request to the @lock endpoint:

http

GET /plone/front-page/@lock HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Authorization: Basic YWRtaW46c2VjcmV0

curl

curl -i -X GET http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock -H "Accept: application/json" --user admin:secret

httpie

http http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock Accept:application/json -a admin:secret

python-requests

requests.get('http://nohost/plone/front-page/@lock', headers={'Accept': 'application/json'}, auth=('admin', 'secret'))

The server responds with status 200 OK and returns the information about the lock:

HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "locked": false,
    "stealable": true
}

Updating a locked object#

To update a locked object with a PATCH request, you have to provide the lock token with the Lock-Token header:

http

PATCH /plone/front-page HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/json
Authorization: Basic YWRtaW46c2VjcmV0
Lock-Token: 0.684672730996-0.25195226375-00105A989226:1477076400.000
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "title": "New Title"
}

curl

curl -i -X PATCH http://nohost/plone/front-page -H "Accept: application/json" -H "Content-Type: application/json" -H "Lock-Token: 0.684672730996-0.25195226375-00105A989226:1477076400.000" --data-raw '{"title": "New Title"}' --user admin:secret

httpie

echo '{
  "title": "New Title"
}' | http PATCH http://nohost/plone/front-page Accept:application/json Content-Type:application/json Lock-Token:"0.684672730996-0.25195226375-00105A989226:1477076400.000" -a admin:secret

python-requests

requests.patch('http://nohost/plone/front-page', headers={'Accept': 'application/json', 'Content-Type': 'application/json', 'Lock-Token': '0.684672730996-0.25195226375-00105A989226:1477076400.000'}, json={'title': 'New Title'}, auth=('admin', 'secret'))
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