(Excel) Read S3 Object Metadata of File Already Uploaded to S3

Demonstrates how to retrieve the metadata from an S3 object.

The HEAD operation retrieves metadata from an object without returning the object itself. This operation is useful if you are interested only in an object's metadata. To use HEAD, you must have READ access to the object.

A HEAD request has the same options as a GET operation on an object. The response is identical to the GET response except that there is no response body.

Download Excel Class Modules Chilkat Excel Class Modules

' This requires the Chilkat API to have been previously unlocked.
' See Global Unlock Sample for sample code.

Dim http As Chilkat.Http
Set http = Chilkat.NewHttp

' Insert your AWS keys here:
http.AwsAccessKey = "AWS_ACCESS_KEY"
http.AwsSecretKey = "AWS_SECRET_KEY"


bucketName = "chilkat.ocean"

objectName = "seahorse.jpg"

' User-defined metadata are name/value pairs, and are returned in the HTTP response header.
' Metadata header names begin with "x-amz-meta-" to distinguish them from other HTTP headers.
' Note that Amazon S3 stores user-defined metadata keys in lowercase.

' A HEAD request can be sent to return the response header without the response body.
' The S3_FileExists method sends a HEAD request.
' It can be used to get the response header.

retval = http.S3_FileExists(bucketName,objectName)
If (retval < 0) Then
    Debug.Print "Failed to check for the S3 object existence"
    Debug.Print http.LastErrorText
    Exit Sub
End If

If (retval = 0) Then
    Debug.Print "The S3 object does not exist."
    Exit Sub
End If

' The response header is available in the LastResponseHeader property.

responseHeader = http.LastResponseHeader
Debug.Print "Response header:"
Debug.Print responseHeader
Debug.Print "--"

' Here is an example response header:

' 	x-amz-id-2: uS4Flff04M8x5YWajU231TP0ClBL19mMhuyfU5ZVQd6NsUHXVhHK+H3b0sjxY98Fujet1ejhyzk=
' 	x-amz-request-id: 27950009AA8E68AA
' 	Date: Mon, 23 Jan 2017 20:12:58 GMT
' 	Last-Modified: Fri, 20 Jan 2017 00:22:57 GMT
' 	ETag: "a8551f0a5437f43a796fca7623ee9232"
' 	x-amz-meta-species: big-belly seahorse
' 	x-amz-meta-genus: Hippocampus
' 	x-amz-meta-habitat: shallow tropical and temperate waters
' 	Accept-Ranges: bytes
' 	Content-Type: image/jpg
' 	Content-Length: 24388
' 	Server: AmazonS3

' HTTP requests and responses are MIME.  For easy parsing, the response header
' can be loaded into a Chilkat MIME object
Dim mime As Chilkat.Mime
Set mime = Chilkat.NewMime

Dim success As Boolean
success = mime.LoadMime(responseHeader)

' Examine the metadata values:
Debug.Print "x-amz-meta-species: "; mime.GetHeaderField("x-amz-meta-species")
Debug.Print "x-amz-meta-genus: "; mime.GetHeaderField("x-amz-meta-genus")
Debug.Print "x-amz-meta-habitat: "; mime.GetHeaderField("x-amz-meta-habitat")
Debug.Print "--"

' It is possible to iterate over the header fields to find all x-amz-meta* headers

i = 0

numHeaders = mime.NumHeaderFields
Dim sbName As Chilkat.StringBuilder
Set sbName = Chilkat.NewStringBuilder
Do While i < numHeaders
    success = sbName.SetString(mime.GetHeaderFieldName(i))
    If (sbName.StartsWith("x-amz-meta",False) = True) Then
        Debug.Print sbName.GetAsString(); ": "; mime.GetHeaderFieldValue(i)
    End If

    i = i + 1
Loop

' The output:

' 	x-amz-meta-species: big-belly seahorse
' 	x-amz-meta-genus: Hippocampus
' 	x-amz-meta-habitat: shallow tropical and temperate waters