AWS Documentation » Amazon Product Advertising API Docs » Developer Guide » API Reference » Common Request Parameters

Common Request Parameters

The following table describes the request parameters that all Product Advertising API operations can use.

Parameter	Definition	Required
AssociateTag	An alphanumeric token that uniquely identifies an Associate. This token is the means by which Amazon identifies the Associate to credit for a sale. If a request is made without identifying an Associate, Associate fees are not paid by Amazon. If the AssociateTag is included in the CartCreate request, the value for AssociateTag is automatically included in the PurchaseURL, which is returned by CartCreate. To obtain an Associate Tag, see Sign up as an Amazon Associate. Valid values: An alphanumeric token distributed by Amazon that uniquely identifies an Associate. Use this value in all requests to receive credit for the customer purchases.	Yes
AWSAccessKeyId	An alphanumeric token that uniquely identifies a seller. For information about getting an AWS access key ID, see Sign up for the Product Advertising API. Valid value: AWS access key ID.	Yes
ContentType	Specifies the format of the content in the response. For example, to transform your Product Advertising API response into HTML, set ContentType to text/html. Valid values: text/html, text/xml	No
MerchantId	An optional parameter that can be used to filter search results and offer listings to include only items sold by Amazon. By default, the API returns items sold by various merchants including Amazon. If the value "Amazon" is supplied, only items sold by Amazon are included in the response. Valid values: Amazon	No
Operation	Specifies the Product Advertising API operation to execute. For more information, see Operations. Valid values: An Product Advertising API operation, for example, ItemLookup.	Yes
Service	Specifies the Product Advertising API service. There is only one value for all Product Advertising API operations. Valid value: AWSECommerceService	Yes
Validate	Prevents an operation from executing. Set the Validate parameter to True to test your request without actually executing it. When present, Validate must equal True; the default value is False. If a request is not actually executed (Validate=True), only a subset of the errors for a request may be returned because some errors (for example, no_exact_matches) are only generated during the execution of a request. Default: False Valid values: True, False	No
Version	The version of the Product Advertising API software and WSDL to use. By default, the 2013-08-01 version is used. Alternately, specify a software version, such as 2013-08-01. Default: 2013-08-01 Valid values: Valid WSDL version date, for example, 2013-08-01.	No
XMLEscaping	Specifies whether responses are XML-encoded in a single pass or a double pass. By default, XMLEscaping is Single, and Product Advertising API responses are encoded only once in XML. For example, if the response data includes an ampersand character (&), the character is returned in its regular XML encoding (&). If XMLEscaping is Double, the same ampersand character is XML-encoded twice (&). The Double value for XMLEscaping is useful in some clients, such as PHP, that do not decode text within XML elements. Default: Single Valid values: Single, Double	No