Category: service

Edge Security Acceleration (ESA) - Pages, Edge Routine, KV, Site Management, Analytics & More

Use Alibaba Cloud OpenAPI (RPC) with official Python SDK to manage all ESA capabilities.

Alibaba Cloud ESA provides five core capabilities:

• Pages — Deploy HTML or static directories to edge nodes (quick deployment flow based on Edge Routine)
• Edge Routine (ER) — Full lifecycle management of serverless edge functions
• Edge KV — Distributed edge key-value storage with Namespace/Key/Value management
• Site Management — Site management, DNS records, cache rules, certificates, etc.
• Analytics — Traffic analysis, time-series trends, Top-N rankings, bandwidth statistics, request metrics

Use Python SDK uniformly to call ESA OpenAPI.

Prerequisites

• Prepare AccessKey (RAM user/role with least privilege).
• Install Python SDK: pip install alibabacloud_esa20240910 alibabacloud_tea_openapi alibabacloud_credentials
• ESA OpenAPI is RPC style; prefer SDK or OpenAPI Explorer to avoid manual signing.

SDK quickstart

from alibabacloud_esa20240910.client import Client as Esa20240910Client
from alibabacloud_esa20240910 import models as esa_models
from alibabacloud_tea_openapi import models as open_api_models


def create_client(region_id: str = "cn-hangzhou") -> Esa20240910Client:
    config = open_api_models.Config(
        region_id=region_id,
        endpoint="esa.cn-hangzhou.aliyuncs.com",
    )
    return Esa20240910Client(config)

Pages — Edge Page Deployment

Pages is a quick deployment flow based on Edge Routine, deploying HTML or static directories to the edge.

HTML Page Deployment Flow

CreateRoutine → GetRoutineStagingCodeUploadInfo → Upload code to OSS
→ CommitRoutineStagingCode → PublishRoutineCodeVersion(staging)
→ PublishRoutineCodeVersion(production) → GetRoutine(get access URL)

Static Directory Deployment Flow

CreateRoutine → CreateRoutineWithAssetsCodeVersion → Package zip and upload to OSS
→ Poll GetRoutineCodeVersionInfo(wait for available)
→ CreateRoutineCodeDeployment(staging) → CreateRoutineCodeDeployment(production)
→ GetRoutine(get access URL)

Zip Package Structure

The zip package structure depends on EDGE_ROUTINE_TYPE (automatically determined by checkEdgeRoutineType based on whether entry file and assets directory exist):

• JS_ONLY: routine/index.js (bundled with esbuild or --no-bundle to read source files directly)
• ASSETS_ONLY: All static files under assets/, maintaining original directory structure
• JS_AND_ASSETS: routine/index.js + assets/ static resources (most common)

The assets/ path is relative to assets.directory in configuration. Configuration priority: CLI args > esa.jsonc / esa.toml.

Key Notes

• Function name rules: lowercase letters/numbers/hyphens, start with lowercase letter, length >= 2
• Same name function: Reuse if exists, deploy new version code
• Deploy to both staging and production by default
• After successful deployment, get defaultRelatedRecord via GetRoutine as access domain

Detailed reference: references/pages.md

Edge Routine (ER) — Edge Functions

Manage the complete lifecycle of serverless edge functions via Python SDK.

Core Workflow

CreateRoutine → GetRoutineStagingCodeUploadInfo → Upload code to OSS
→ CommitRoutineStagingCode → PublishRoutineCodeVersion
→ (CreateRoutineRoute) → GetRoutine

API Summary

• Function Management: CreateRoutine, DeleteRoutine, GetRoutine, GetRoutineUserInfo, ListUserRoutines
• Code Version: GetRoutineStagingCodeUploadInfo, CommitRoutineStagingCode, PublishRoutineCodeVersion, DeleteRoutineCodeVersion
• Routes: CreateRoutineRoute, UpdateRoutineRoute, DeleteRoutineRoute, GetRoutineRoute, ListRoutineRoutes, ListSiteRoutes
• Related Records: CreateRoutineRelatedRecord, DeleteRoutineRelatedRecord, ListRoutineRelatedRecords

ER Code Format

export default {
  async fetch(request) {
    return new Response("Hello", {
      headers: { "content-type": "text/html;charset=UTF-8" },
    });
  },
};

Detailed reference: references/er.md

Edge KV — Edge Key-Value Storage

Distributed edge key-value storage, readable and writable in Edge Routine, also manageable via OpenAPI/SDK.

Core Concepts

• Namespace: Isolation container for KV data, Key max 512 chars, Value max 2MB (high capacity 25MB)
• Supports TTL expiration: Expiration (Unix timestamp) or ExpirationTtl (seconds)

API Summary

• Namespace: CreateKvNamespace, DeleteKvNamespace, GetKvNamespace, GetKvAccount, DescribeKvAccountStatus
• Single Key Operations: PutKv, GetKv, GetKvDetail, DeleteKv, PutKvWithHighCapacity
• Batch Operations: BatchPutKv, BatchDeleteKv, BatchPutKvWithHighCapacity, BatchDeleteKvWithHighCapacity, ListKvs

Quick Start

client = create_client()

# Create namespace
client.create_kv_namespace(esa_models.CreateKvNamespaceRequest(namespace="my-ns"))

# Write
client.put_kv(esa_models.PutKvRequest(namespace="my-ns", key="k1", value="v1"))

# Read
resp = client.get_kv(esa_models.GetKvRequest(namespace="my-ns", key="k1"))

Detailed reference: references/kv.md

Site Management — Site Management

Use Python SDK to manage ESA sites, DNS records, cache rules, etc.

API behavior notes

• Most list APIs support pagination via PageNumber + PageSize.
• ListSites returns sites across all regions; no need to iterate regions.
• Newly created sites start as pending; complete access verification via VerifySite to activate.
• Deleting a site removes all associated configuration.
• UpdateSiteAccessType can switch between CNAME and NS, but switching to CNAME may fail if incompatible DNS records exist.
• DNS record APIs (CreateRecord, ListRecords, etc.) work for both NS and CNAME connected sites. CNAME sites are limited to CNAME and A/AAAA types only, and records cannot disable acceleration (proxy must stay enabled).
• DNS record Type parameter must be exact: use A/AAAA (not A), CNAME, MX, TXT, NS, SRV, CAA.
• CreateCacheRule supports two config types: global (site-wide default) and rule (conditional rule with match expression).

Workflow

1. Confirm target site ID, access type (CNAME/NS), and desired action.
2. Find API group and exact operation name in references/api_overview.md.
3. Call API with Python SDK (preferred) or OpenAPI Explorer.
4. Verify results with describe/list APIs.
5. If you need repeatable inventory or summaries, use scripts/ and write outputs under output/alicloud-network-esa/.

SDK priority

1. Python SDK (preferred)
2. OpenAPI Explorer
3. Other SDKs (only if Python is not feasible)

Python SDK scripts (recommended for inventory)

• List all ESA sites: scripts/list_sites.py
• Summarize sites by plan: scripts/summary_sites_by_plan.py
• Check site status: scripts/check_site_status.py
• List DNS records for a site: scripts/list_dns_records.py

Analytics — Traffic Analysis

Query and analyze ESA site traffic data using DescribeSiteTimeSeriesData and DescribeSiteTopData APIs.

Core Features

• Time-Series Data: Query traffic trends with configurable time granularity
• Top-N Rankings: Get rankings by country/IP/host/path/status code dimensions
• Multiple Metrics: Traffic, Requests, RequestTraffic, PageView
• Rich Dimensions: Country, province, ISP, browser, device, host, path, status code, etc.

Two Main APIs

1. DescribeSiteTimeSeriesData - Time-Series Trends

Query traffic trends over time, returning aggregated data points.

Time Granularity Rules:

Time Range	Interval	Interval Value
<= 3 hours	1 minute	60
3-12 hours	5 minutes	300
12 hours - 1 day	15 minutes	900
1-10 days	1 hour	3600
10-31 days	1 day	86400

2. DescribeSiteTopData - Top-N Rankings

Query Top-N ranking data by various dimensions.

Limit Options: 5, 10, 150

Available Metrics (FieldName)

Field	Type	Description
Traffic	int	Response traffic from ESA to client (bytes)
Requests	int	Number of requests
RequestTraffic	int	Client request traffic (bytes)
PageView	int	Page views

Available Dimensions

Geographic Dimensions: ClientCountryCode (country), ClientProvinceCode (province), ClientISP (ISP), ClientASN

Client Info: ClientIP, ClientIPVersion, ClientBrowser, ClientDevice, ClientOS

Request Details: ClientRequestHost, ClientRequestMethod, ClientRequestPath, ClientRequestProtocol, ClientRequestQuery, ClientRequestReferer, ClientRequestUserAgent

Response/Cache: EdgeCacheStatus, EdgeResponseStatusCode, EdgeResponseContentType, OriginResponseStatusCode

Others: ALL (aggregated), SiteId (account-level query), Version, ClientSSLProtocol, ClientXRequestedWith

Error Handling

HTTP Code	Error Code	Description
400	InvalidParameter.TimeRange	Time range exceeded (max 31 days)
400	InvalidEndTime.Mismatch	EndTime earlier than StartTime
400	InvalidParameter.Field	Invalid field name
400	InvalidParameter.Dimension	Invalid dimension
400	InvalidTime.Malformed	Time format error (use yyyy-MM-ddTHH:mm:ssZ)

Detailed reference: references/time-series.md, references/top-data.md, references/fields.md

Common operation mapping

Site Management

• Create site: CreateSite
• List sites: ListSites (supports SiteName, Status, AccessType, Coverage filters)
• Get site details: GetSite
• Delete site: DeleteSite
• Check site name availability: CheckSiteName
• Verify site ownership: VerifySite
• Update access type: UpdateSiteAccessType
• Update coverage: UpdateSiteCoverage
• Get current nameservers: GetSiteCurrentNS
• Update custom nameservers: UpdateSiteVanityNS
• Pause/resume site: UpdateSitePause, GetSitePause
• Site exclusivity: UpdateSiteNameExclusive, GetSiteNameExclusive
• Version management: ActivateVersionManagement, DeactivateVersionManagement

Site Configuration

• IPv6: GetIPv6, UpdateIPv6

DNS Records

NS access: full record type support. CNAME access: only CNAME and A/AAAA, proxy must stay enabled.

• Create record: CreateRecord
• List records: ListRecords (supports Type, RecordName, Proxied filters)
• Get record: GetRecord
• Update record: UpdateRecord
• Delete record: DeleteRecord
• Batch create: BatchCreateRecords
• Export records: ExportRecords

Cache Rules

• Create cache rule: CreateCacheRule
• List cache rules: ListCacheRules
• Get cache rule: GetCacheRule
• Update cache rule: UpdateCacheRule
• Delete cache rule: DeleteCacheRule

Cache rule expression notes (important):

• CreateCacheRule parameters are flat, not a nested JSON Rule object.
• The Rule parameter is a match condition expression string. See Rule Expression Syntax section below.
• Quick reminders: ends_with()/starts_with() must use function-call style; matches (regex) requires standard plan or above.
• Set edge cache TTL with --EdgeCacheMode override_origin --EdgeCacheTtl <seconds>.

Rule Expression Syntax

ESA uses a unified rule engine expression syntax across multiple features (cache rules, WAF custom rules, rate limiting, URL rewrite, header modification, etc.).

When to use

Use this syntax for the Rule parameter in any ESA API that accepts a match condition expression:

• CreateCacheRule / UpdateCacheRule - Cache rules
• CreateWafRule / UpdateWafRule - WAF custom rules
• CreateRatePlanRule - Rate limiting rules
• CreateRewriteUrlRule / UpdateRewriteUrlRule - URL rewrite rules
• Origin rules, redirect rules, header modification rules, etc.

Expression format

(condition)
(condition1 and condition2)
(condition1) or (condition2)

Max nesting depth: 2 levels.

Operator syntax - two styles

Infix style (operator between field and value):

(field eq "value")
(field ne "value")
(field contains "value")
(field in {"value1" "value2"})
(field matches "regex")

Function style (operator wraps field):

(starts_with(field, "value"))
(ends_with(field, "value"))
(exists(field))
(len(field) gt 100)
(lower(field) eq "value")

Common patterns

# Match file extension
--Rule '(http.request.uri.path.extension eq "html")'

# Match multiple extensions
--Rule '(http.request.uri.path.extension in {"js" "css" "png" "jpg"})'

# Match URL prefix
--Rule '(starts_with(http.request.uri, "/api/"))'

# Match URL suffix