Get started¶

Requirements¶

Python 3.11 or later.
A DRS API key.

Get an API key¶

Go to drs.faa.gov.
Open DRS Help & Training, then DRS API.
Click Request / Renew API Key.
Follow the steps.

Install¶

uvpip

uv add faa-drs

pip install faa-drs

Set the API key¶

Set the DRS_API_KEY environment variable:

export DRS_API_KEY="your-key"

The client reads this variable. You can also give the key directly:

drs = DRSClient(api_key="your-key")

Warning

Do not put the API key in source code that you share.

Make a request¶

from faa_drs import DRSClient, DocType

with DRSClient() as drs:
    page = drs.list_documents(DocType.AC)
    print(page.total)

    for doc in page.documents[:5]:
        print(doc.number, doc.status, doc.title)

list_documents gets one page. iter_documents gets all pages:

with DRSClient() as drs:
    for doc in drs.iter_documents(DocType.AC, limit=100):
        print(doc.number)

Always close the client. Use a with block, or call drs.close().

Read a document¶

A Document has common fields as attributes:

Attribute	Description
`guid`	Unique ID in DRS. Always present.
`doctype`	Document type code.
`number`, `title`, `status`	Values of `drs:documentNumber`, `drs:title` and `drs:status`.
`last_modified`	Last change in DRS (UTC). Can be `None`.
`url`	Page in the DRS web application.
`download_url`, `file_name`	Main file. `None` if there is no file.
`has_attachments`	`True` if there are more files.
`content`	Full text fields, if the API supplies them.

Other fields are in doc.metadata. Use the API field name:

doc["drs:approvalDate"]  # Raises KeyError if missing.
doc.get("drs:cancels")  # Returns None if missing.
doc.get_list("drs:partNumber")  # Always a list of strings.
doc.get_date("drs:approvalDate")  # A datetime.date, or None.

To find the fields of a document type, see Filters.