Making API calls using the python requests library is relatively easy but requires a bit of boilerplate code. For more in-depth documentation on the requests library, refer to Requests: HTTP for Humans™

For specifics on the structure of API calls, see Anatomy of an API request

Getting a list of devices with python's requests library

1. Import the requests and json library; pprint is optional

   import requests, json, pprint

2. Set your router endpoint URL, headers, SSL verification, and your username and password

   api_endpoint = 'https://my_zenoss_instance.company.com/zport/dmd/device_router'
   api_headers = {'Content-Type': 'application/json'}
   api_ssl = True
   api_username = 'myApiUsername'
   api_password = 'my$up3rS3cUr3ApiP@$$w0rd'

3. Build the API request

   api_action = 'DeviceRouter'
   api_method = 'getDevices'
   api_data = []
   
   payload = json.dumps({'action': api_action,
                         'method': api_method,
                         'data': api_data,
                         'tid': 1})

4. Make the API request

   response = requests.post(api_endpoint,
                            payload,
                            headers=api_headers,
                            auth=(api_username, api_password),
                            verify=api_ssl)

5. Use pprint to view the result

   pprint.pprint(response.json())