Using Developer Tools to get the Payload to Create Azure Budget Alerts for Action Groups (New-AzConsumptionBudget)

Are you trying to create a budget with PowerShell using New-AzConsumptionBudget on a resource group? You might have tried the code reference on this page New-AzConsumptionBudget (Az.Billing) | Microsoft Learn.

# If you update the sample command and try to execute
New-AzConsumptionBudget -ResourceGroupName budgetThis -Amount 60 -Name PSBudgetRG -Category Cost -StartDate 2022-11-01 -EndDate 2024-11-01 -TimeGrain Monthly

If you’re not using a subscription in an EA, you’ll get this error New-AzConsumptionBudget: Operation returned an invalid status code 'BadRequest'

Running get-error doesn’t provide much in the way of help to resolve. After further digging you’ll find the PowerShell reference page, you’ll probably find that Microsoft docs states you have to be an “EA customer, you can create and edit budgets programmatically using the Azure PowerShell module. However, we recommend that you use REST APIs to create and edit budgets because CLI commands might not support the latest version of the APIs."

If you are using EA subscription it still doesn’t create the alerts and the PowerShell doco doesn’t seem easy to use to create these notifications either.

View fullsize

Hopefully, you found this script SetConsumptionBudget.ps1 Create a Consumption Budget for ResourceGroups in Azure (github.com). It is a complete script and is helpful. This is a good implementation of the content documented here. Budgets - Create Or Update - REST API (Azure Consumption) | Microsoft Learn.

What if you couldn’t find a pre-created script what would you do? Or if you wanted a simplified call rather than the long doc example, in this case, I wanted to leverage using an Action Group.

Let’s create a budget through the Azure portal called “CreatedWithUI” and use the browser developer tools (F12) to capture the traffic requests to the Azure API.

View fullsize

After you click “Create” you’ll see traffic and see the request payload

View fullsize

You can copy the properties section, you just need to add the properties name back in.

With some changes to the syntax object, we can create a script to create the budget alerting an Action Group.

# Converted Syntax for use in script
$bodyObject = @{
    "properties"= @{
        "timePeriod" = @{
            "startDate"= "2022-10-01T00:00:00Z"
            "endDate"= "2024-09-30T00:00:00Z"
        }
        "timeGrain" = "Monthly"
        "amount"= 62
        "category"= "Cost"
        "notifications" =@{
            "forecasted_GreaterThan_90_Percent"= @{
                "enabled" = $true
                "operator"= "GreaterThan"
                "threshold"= 90
                "contactGroups"= @("/subscriptions/00000000-1111-2222-3333-444444444444/resourceGroups/cloudmodernization-rg/providers/microsoft.insights/actionGroups/BudgetAlerts")
                "thresholdType"= "Forecasted"
            }
        }
    }
}

The last piece of data we need is the Action Group, which still works in PowerShell

# Parameters
$ActionGroupRGName = "cloudmodernization-rg"
$ActionGroupEmails = @("admin@yourorg.com")
$ActionGroupName = "BudgetAlerts"

# Get existing action Group ID
$ActionGroupId = (Get-AzActionGroup -resourcegroup  cloudmodernization-rg  -Name BudgetAlerts).id

# Create New Action Group
$AlertEmail = New-AzActionGroupReceiver -EmailAddress $ActionGroupEmail -Name ForcastBudgetAlert
$ActionGroupId = (Set-AzActionGroup -ResourceGroupName ($cb.ResourceGroup) -Name $ActionGroupName -ShortName $ActionGroupName -Receiver $AlertEmail).Id

Finally, if you pull all this together calling Invoke-RestMethod it would like something like

# Parameters
$subscriptionId = "00000000-1111-2222-3333-444444444444"
$resourceGroupName = "cloudmodernization-rg"
$ActionGroupName = "BudgetAlerts"
$budgetName = "$resourceGroupName-cb"

# Get existing action Group ID
$ActionGroupId = (Get-AzActionGroup -resourcegroup  $resourceGroupName -Name $ActionGroupName ).id

$bodyObject = @{
    "properties"= @{
        "timePeriod" = @{
            "startDate"= "2022-10-01T00:00:00Z"
            "endDate"= "2024-09-30T00:00:00Z"
        }
        "timeGrain" = "Monthly"
        "amount"= 62
        "category"= "Cost"
        "notifications" = @{
            "forecasted_GreaterThan_90_Percent"= @{
                "enabled" = $true
                "operator"= "GreaterThan"
                "threshold"= 90
                "contactGroups"= @($ActionGroupId)
                "thresholdType"= "Forecasted"
            }
        }
    }
    "filter" =@{}
}

$bearerToken=(Get-AzAccessToken).token
$headers = @{'Authorization' = "Bearer $bearerToken"}
$RequestBody = $bodyObject | convertto-json -Depth 15

$URI = "https://management.azure.com/subscriptions/$subscriptionId/resourceGroups/$resourceGroupName/providers/Microsoft.Consumption/budgets/$budgetName"+"?api-version=2021-10-01"
Invoke-RestMethod -Method Put -ContentType  "application/json; charset=utf-8" -Uri $URI -Headers $headers  -Body $RequestBody

View fullsize

Here are the three budgets $60, $61, and $62 created through this article.

This was aimed at showing you how to get to the payload submitted to the Azure Portal to solve a problem using PowerShell and how to revert to using a direct Azure API call.

Capturing and using API queries from Azure in PowerShell with Fiddler

Similar New Content: Using Developer Tools to get the Payload to Create Azure Budget Alerts for Action Groups (New-AzConsumptionBudget) — Crying Cloud

This is a walkthrough for using Fiddler to capture traffic to Azure from a browser and writing and running that query in PowerShell.  I wrote this because I don't like posts that skip over a key step and explain the entire thing with a wave of the hand.  Although this article stands on it own, it is a key step in another series.

Install & Configure Fiddler

https://www.telerik.com/fiddler. We need to decrypt traffic from Azure.  Basically, you're letting Fiddler get in the middle of the conversation you're having with Azure and take a look at the traffic.  After installation select, Tools -> Options, select capture and decrypt HTTPS traffic.

You need to close and reopen Fiddler.  From the file menu, you can select start or stop, to capture internet traffic. Ensure capture is on and then refresh Azure page you want to query.  In this case, I want to capture data from the cost analysis page for a resource group.  This is easier when you close down most browser windows except the one you want to investigate.  You can also apply filters and capture limitations, but I'll let you figure that out.

Capture Your Query

I want to capture the cost for a resource group with daily totals so we can capture the cost over the month based on resource group tagging.  Browse to a resource group and select cost analysis with capture traffic.

The next part you'll just need to search through the queries and look for what you're after.  Select JSON in the response to see the data returned.

In the above results we can see the rows of cost data in the JSON response page, however, the other record in the row is the resource type, not the date.

This looks better, the columns JSON field shows the Cost, Date, and Currency and we can even see some rows with the right data, so we have the query. Now to create this in PowerShell.

Create Query in PowerShell

First, grab the header and then create a few parameters.  Note this is a POST command.

Raw Header

 
POST /subscriptions/11111111-4444-8888-9999-222222222222/YourResourceGroupName/azurestackproduction/providers/Microsoft.CostManagement/query?api-version=2018-08-31&$top=40000 HTTP/1.1

Converted

$SubscriptionGUID = '11111111-4444-8888-9999-222222222222'  $ResourceGroupName = 'YourResourceGroupName' $usageUri =  "https://management.azure.com/subscriptions/$SubscriptionGUID/resourceGroups/$ResourceGroupName/providers/Microsoft.CostManagement/query?api-version=2018-08-31"

We need to create the JSON object that is passed with the POST. Shown above is what we need to recreate.

Select Raw and capture the text in the brackets. This will take a little bit of effort to convert into a PowerShell JSON object with variables.

• commas , become semi colons ;

• the { needs a @ in front of it @{

• colons : need =

RAW

 
{"type":"Usage","timeframe":"Custom","timePeriod":{"from":"2018-10-01T00:00:00+00:00","to":"2018-10-31T23:59:59+00:00"},"dataSet":{"granularity":"Daily","aggregation":{"totalCost":{"name":"PreTaxCost","function":"Sum"}},"sorting":[{"direction":"ascending","name":"UsageDate"}]}}

Converted

$year =(get-date).year $month =(get-date).Month $DaysInMonth= [DateTime]::DaysInMonth($year, $month ) $Body = @{"type"="Usage";"timeframe"="Custom";"timePeriod"=@{"from"="$($year)-$($month)-01T00:00:00+00:00";"to"="$($year)-$($month)-$($DaysInMonth)T23:59:59+00:00"};"dataSet"=@{"granularity"="Daily";"aggregation"=@{"totalCost"=@{"name"="PreTaxCost";"function"="Sum"}};"sorting"=@(@{"direction"="ascending";"name"="UsageDate"})}}

BearerToken

To access this data since we aren't logged in with PowerShell you need a bearer token.  Luckily someone has written a helpful query to capture the bearer token from your existing session. https://gallery.technet.microsoft.com/scriptcenter/Easily-obtain-AccessToken-3ba6e593. 

function Get-AzureRmCachedAccessToken() {   $ErrorActionPreference = 'Stop'

  if(-not (Get-Module AzureRm.Profile)) {     Import-Module AzureRm.Profile   }   $azureRmProfileModuleVersion = (Get-Module AzureRm.Profile).Version   # refactoring performed in AzureRm.Profile v3.0 or later   if($azureRmProfileModuleVersion.Major -ge 3) {     $azureRmProfile = [Microsoft.Azure.Commands.Common.Authentication.Abstractions.AzureRmProfileProvider]::Instance.Profile     if(-not $azureRmProfile.Accounts.Count) {       Write-Error "Ensure you have logged in before calling this function."         }   } else {     # AzureRm.Profile < v3.0     $azureRmProfile = [Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Commands.Common.AzureRmProfileProvider]::Instance.Profile     if(-not $azureRmProfile.Context.Account.Count) {       Write-Error "Ensure you have logged in before calling this function."         }   }

  $currentAzureContext = Get-AzureRmContext   $profileClient = New-Object Microsoft.Azure.Commands.ResourceManager.Common.RMProfileClient($azureRmProfile)   Write-Debug ("Getting access token for tenant" + $currentAzureContext.Subscription.TenantId)   $token = $profileClient.AcquireAccessToken($currentAzureContext.Subscription.TenantId)   $token.AccessToken }

If we include this function in our code and write a few more lines we are ready to start putting it all together. We create the headers sections, we use invoke-restmethod with POST we pass the body which must be converted with depth 100 otherwise data gets chopped out.

$token = Get-AzureRmCachedAccessToken  $headers = @{"authorization"="bearer $token"} 

$results = Invoke-RestMethod $usageUri -Headers $headers -ContentType "application/json" -Method Post -Body ($body | ConvertTo-Json -Depth 100) 

Final Script

$SubscriptionGUID = '11111111-4444-8888-9999-222222222222'  $ResourceGroupName = 'YourResourceGroupName'

function Get-AzureRmCachedAccessToken() {   $ErrorActionPreference = 'Stop'

  if(-not (Get-Module AzureRm.Profile)) {     Import-Module AzureRm.Profile   }   $azureRmProfileModuleVersion = (Get-Module AzureRm.Profile).Version   # refactoring performed in AzureRm.Profile v3.0 or later   if($azureRmProfileModuleVersion.Major -ge 3) {     $azureRmProfile = [Microsoft.Azure.Commands.Common.Authentication.Abstractions.AzureRmProfileProvider]::Instance.Profile     if(-not $azureRmProfile.Accounts.Count) {       Write-Error "Ensure you have logged in before calling this function."         }   } else {     # AzureRm.Profile < v3.0     $azureRmProfile = [Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Commands.Common.AzureRmProfileProvider]::Instance.Profile     if(-not $azureRmProfile.Context.Account.Count) {       Write-Error "Ensure you have logged in before calling this function."         }   }

  $currentAzureContext = Get-AzureRmContext   $profileClient = New-Object Microsoft.Azure.Commands.ResourceManager.Common.RMProfileClient($azureRmProfile)   Write-Debug ("Getting access token for tenant" + $currentAzureContext.Subscription.TenantId)   $token = $profileClient.AcquireAccessToken($currentAzureContext.Subscription.TenantId)   $token.AccessToken }

$year =(get-date).year $month =(get-date).Month $DaysInMonth= [DateTime]::DaysInMonth($year, $month )

$token =  Get-AzureRmCachedAccessToken $headers = @{"authorization"="bearer $token"} $Body =  @{"type"="Usage";"timeframe"="Custom";"timePeriod"=@{"from"="$($year)-$($month)-01T00:00:00+00:00";"to"="$($year)-$($month)-$($DaysInMonth)T23:59:59+00:00"};"dataSet"=@{"granularity"="Daily";"aggregation"=@{"totalCost"=@{"name"="PreTaxCost";"function"="Sum"}};"sorting"=@(@{"direction"="ascending";"name"="UsageDate"})}} 

$usageUri = "https://management.azure.com/subscriptions/$SubscriptionGUID/resourceGroups/$ResourceGroupName/providers/Microsoft.CostManagement/query?api-version=2018-08-31"    $results = Invoke-RestMethod $usageUri -Headers $headers -ContentType "application/json" -Method Post -Body ($body | ConvertTo-Json -Depth 100) 

$results.properties.columns $results.properties.rows

Results

This shows the two output selected columns and rows

Good luck creating your own queries, I hope you found this helpful.

You can find another similar article by Microsoft here