Extend /api/status to support HEAD request

[kornicameister]

I've been checking out Kibana status page recently and what I really missed was support for HEAD method for /api/status call. An idea would be to respond with OK code if overall status is green and with 503 if something is unavailable.

This issue is enhancement proposal.

[rashidkpc]

Probably not something we'll add near term, but I'd take a pull for it.

[kornicameister]

I guess it is not possible to complete. Looks like they have OPTIONS in favor of HEAD,
and actually adding HEAD as another method for already exiting route:

server.route({
    method: 'GET',
    path: '/api/status',
    handler: function (request, reply) {
      return reply({
        status: kbnServer.status.toJSON(),
        metrics: kbnServer.metrics
      });
    }
  });

results in error
FATAL [Error: Method name not allowed: HEAD /api/status]

However if you'd issued OPTIONS under /api/status it will work as long as kbn-version header is present in request. It looks a little weird, because GET works fine without that header whereas OPTIONS needs it.

Do you have any idea why that happens ?

[spalger]

Looks like hapi always uses GET handlers for HEAD requests. You would need to detect the method within the handler to see if it's a HEAD request, but that sounds dirty to me.

If all you're looking for is a 200/503 api I suggest sending HEAD request to /app/kibana (or whatever other apps you want to monitor).

If you want a simpler status API, I think an api like /api/status/{status_id}/{sub_property} might make sense. Though I don't really think it's the status API's job to convert red/green/yellow into status codes.

[kornicameister]

@spalger, that is exactly what I've been doing :) (i.e. sending request to /app/kibana).
I think I am fine with what is already there and if adding some lean HTTP method to the content is not as straightforward as it initially seemed, maybe that's totally off the point.

[timroes]

cc @elastic/kibana-operations

[tylersmalley]

Closing this in favor of creating a new endpoint for this purpose which is tracked here.