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Solve the following problem using Python, implementing the functions described below, one line at a time
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Description:
 def shards(self):
 """ Retrieves information about the shards in the current remote database. :returns: Shard information retrieval status in JSON format """

        url = '/'.join((self.database_url, '_shards'))
        resp = self.r_session.get(url)
        resp.raise_for_status()

        return response_to_json_dict(resp)