Sql Python API Docs | dltHub
Build a Sql-to-database pipeline in Python using dlt with AI Workbench support for Claude Code, Cursor, and Codex.
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REST APIs use HTTP methods for CRUD operations; they are stateless and rely on URIs for resource identification; they facilitate data exchange between applications. The REST API base URL is https://sqladmin.googleapis.com/sql/v1beta4 and all requests require an OAuth2 Bearer token in the Authorization header.
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 pip install "dlt[workspace]" and start loading Sql data in under 10 minutes.
What data can I load from Sql?
Here are some of the endpoints you can load from Sql:
| Resource | Endpoint | Method | Data selector | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| instances | instances/list | GET | items | List Cloud SQL instances in a project |
| instances | instances/get | GET | Get instance details (single instance returned as JSON object) | |
| databases | databases/list | GET | items | List databases on an instance |
| users | users/list | GET | items | List users for an instance |
| backup_runs | backups/list | GET | items | List backup runs for an instance |
| operations | operations/list | GET | items | List operations (long‑running ops) for a project or instance |
| flags | flags/list | GET | items | List supported database flags |
| tiers | tiers/list | GET | items | List service tiers for Cloud SQL |
| connectivity | connectSettings/get | GET | Get connect settings for an instance |
How do I authenticate with the Sql API?
Cloud SQL Admin uses OAuth 2.0 Bearer tokens in the Authorization header; service‑account or user OAuth tokens are required.
1. Get your credentials
- In Google Cloud Console enable the Cloud SQL Admin API for your project.
- Create credentials: recommended: a service account with the appropriate Cloud SQL IAM roles (Cloud SQL Admin or Cloud SQL Client) and generate a JSON key; or create OAuth 2.0 Client credentials for user‑based flows.
- For service‑account use: run
gcloud auth activate-service-account --key-file=KEY.jsonor generate a short‑lived access token viagcloud auth print-access-token. - For application code, exchange the service account key (JWT) for an access token or use Google client libraries to obtain a token; place the resulting access token as
tokenin the dlt source config and pass it to the source.
2. Add them to .dlt/secrets.toml
[sources.sql_source] token = "ya29.your_oauth2_access_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 venv && source .venv/bin/activate uv pip install "dlt[workspace]"
1. Install the dlt AI Workbench:
dlt 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:
dlt ai toolkit rest-api-pipeline install
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 Sql 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:
python sql_pipeline.py
If everything is configured correctly, you'll see output like this:
Pipeline sql_pipeline load step completed in 0.26 seconds 1 load package(s) were loaded to destination duckdb and into dataset sql_data The duckdb destination used duckdb:/sql.duckdb location to store data Load package 1749667187.541553 is LOADED and contains no failed jobs
Inspect your pipeline and data:
dlt pipeline sql_pipeline 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 instances and databases from the Sql 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 sql_source(token=dlt.secrets.value): config: RESTAPIConfig = { "client": { "base_url": "https://sqladmin.googleapis.com/sql/v1beta4", "auth": { "type": "bearer", "token": token, }, }, "resources": [ {"name": "instances", "endpoint": {"path": "instances", "data_selector": "items"}}, {"name": "databases", "endpoint": {"path": "databases", "data_selector": "items"}} ], } yield from rest_api_resources(config) def get_data() -> None: pipeline = dlt.pipeline( pipeline_name="sql_pipeline", destination="duckdb", dataset_name="sql_data", ) load_info = pipeline.run(sql_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("sql_pipeline").dataset() sessions_df = data.instances.df() print(sessions_df.head())
SQL (DuckDB example):
SELECT * FROM sql_data.instances LIMIT 10;
In a marimo or Jupyter notebook:
import dlt data = dlt.pipeline("sql_pipeline").dataset() data.instances.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 Sql data to?
dlt supports loading into any of these destinations — only the destination parameter changes:
| Destination | Example 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 Workbench:
data-exploration— Build custom notebooks, charts, and dashboards for deeper analysis with marimo notebooks.dlthub-runtime— Deploy, schedule, and monitor your pipeline in production.
dlt ai toolkit data-exploration install dlt ai toolkit dlthub-runtime install
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