Jira Service Desk Python API Docs | dltHub

Build a Jira Service Desk-to-database pipeline in Python using dlt with AI harness support for Claude Code, Cursor, and Codex.

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Jira Service Management REST API enables programmatic management of service desk projects, requests, and portal configurations. The REST API base URL is https://your-domain.atlassian.net/rest/servicedeskapi/ and Basic authentication using email and API token, or OAuth 2.0..

dlt is an open-source Python library that handles authentication, pagination, and schema evolution automatically. dlthub provides AI context files that enable code assistants to generate production-ready pipelines. Install with uv add "dlt[hub]" and start loading Jira Service Desk data in under 10 minutes.


What data can I load from Jira Service Desk?

Here are some of the endpoints you can load from Jira Service Desk:

ResourceEndpointMethodData selectorDescription
organizationsrest/servicedeskapi/organizationGETvaluesReturns a paginated list of all organizations.
organization_usersrest/servicedeskapi/organization/{organizationId}/userGETvaluesReturns a paginated list of users in an organization.
service_desk_organizationrest/servicedeskapi/servicedesk/{serviceDeskId}/organizationGETvaluesReturns a paginated list of organizations for a specific service desk.
requestrest/servicedeskapi/requestGETvaluesReturns a list of customer requests.
approvalrest/servicedeskapi/approvalGETvaluesReturns a list of approvals.

How do I authenticate with the Jira Service Desk API?

For basic authentication, requests require an 'Authorization' header with a value of 'Basic <base64_encoded_credentials>'. The credentials must be a string formatted as 'email@example.com

', where the token is an Atlassian account API token.

1. Get your credentials

  1. Log in to your Atlassian account at https://id.atlassian.com/manage-profile/security/api-tokens. 2. Click 'Create API token'. 3. Enter a label for the token (e.g., 'dlt-pipeline') and click 'Create'. 4. Copy the token to a secure location, as it will not be displayed again. If you are using a service account, navigate to Atlassian Administration > Directory > Service accounts, select the account, and create the credentials there.

2. Add them to .dlt/secrets.toml

[sources.jira_service_desk_source] subdomain = "your-domain" email = "your-email@example.com" api_token = "your-api-token-here"

dlt reads this automatically at runtime — never hardcode tokens in your pipeline script. For production environments, see setting up credentials with dlt for environment variable and vault-based options.


How do I set up and run the pipeline?

Set up a virtual environment and install dlt:

uv init uv add "dlt[hub]"

1. Install the dlt AI harness:

uv run dlthub ai init --agent <your-agent> # <agent>: claude | cursor | codex

This installs project rules, a secrets management skill, appropriate ignore files, and configures the dlt MCP server for your agent. Learn more →

2. Install the rest-api-pipeline toolkit:

uv run dlthub ai toolkit install rest-api-pipeline

This loads the skills and context about dlt the agent uses to build the pipeline iteratively, efficiently, and safely. The agent uses MCP tools to inspect credentials — it never needs to read your secrets.toml directly. Learn more →

3. Start LLM-assisted coding:

Use /find-source to load data from the Jira Service Desk API into DuckDB.

The rest-api-pipeline toolkit takes over from here — it reads relevant API documentation, presents you with options for which endpoints to load, and follows a structured workflow to scaffold, debug, and validate the pipeline step by step.

4. Run the pipeline:

uv run python jira_service_desk_pipeline.py

If everything is configured correctly, you'll see output like this:

Pipeline jira_service_desk_pipeline load step completed in 0.26 seconds 1 load package(s) were loaded to destination duckdb and into dataset jira_service_desk_data The duckdb destination used duckdb:/jira_service_desk.duckdb location to store data Load package 1749667187.541553 is LOADED and contains no failed jobs

Inspect your pipeline and data:

uv run dlthub show

This opens the Pipeline Dashboard where you can verify pipeline state, load metrics, schema (tables, columns, types), and query the loaded data directly.


Python pipeline example

This example loads issues and search from the Jira Service Desk API into DuckDB. It mirrors the endpoint and data selector configuration from the table above:

import dlt from dlt.sources.rest_api import RESTAPIConfig, rest_api_resources @dlt.source def jira_service_desk_source(api_token=dlt.secrets.value): config: RESTAPIConfig = { "client": { "base_url": "https://your-domain.atlassian.net/rest/servicedeskapi/", "auth": {"type": "http_basic", "username": "REPLACE_ME", "password": api_token}, }, "resources": [ {"name": "organizations", "endpoint": {"path": "rest/servicedeskapi/organization", "data_selector": "values"}}, {"name": "request", "endpoint": {"path": "rest/servicedeskapi/request", "data_selector": "values"}} ], } yield from rest_api_resources(config) def get_data() -> None: pipeline = dlt.pipeline( pipeline_name="jira_service_desk_pipeline", destination="duckdb", dataset_name="jira_service_desk_data", ) load_info = pipeline.run(jira_service_desk_source()) print(load_info)

To add more endpoints, append entries from the resource table to the "resources" list using the same name, path, and data_selector pattern.


How do I query the loaded data?

Once the pipeline runs, dlt creates one table per resource. You can query with Python or SQL.

Python (pandas DataFrame):

import dlt data = dlt.pipeline("jira_service_desk_pipeline").dataset() sessions_df = data.request.df() print(sessions_df.head())

SQL (DuckDB example):

SELECT * FROM jira_service_desk_data.request LIMIT 10;

In a marimo or Jupyter notebook:

import dlt data = dlt.pipeline("jira_service_desk_pipeline").dataset() data.request.df().head()

See how to explore your data in marimo Notebooks and how to query your data in Python with dataset.


What destinations can I load Jira Service Desk data to?

dlt supports loading into any of these destinations — only the destination parameter changes:

DestinationExample value
DuckDB (local, default)"duckdb"
PostgreSQL"postgres"
BigQuery"bigquery"
Snowflake"snowflake"
Redshift"redshift"
Databricks"databricks"
Filesystem (S3, GCS, Azure)"filesystem"

Change the destination in dlt.pipeline(destination="snowflake") and add credentials in .dlt/secrets.toml. See the full destinations list.


Next steps

Continue your data engineering journey with the other toolkits of the dltHub AI harness:

  • data-exploration — Build custom notebooks, charts, and dashboards for deeper analysis with marimo notebooks.
  • dlthub-platform — Deploy, schedule, and monitor your pipeline in production.
uv run dlthub ai toolkit install data-exploration uv run dlthub ai toolkit install dlthub-platform

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