Docs & Usage Guide

Alation AI Agent SDK

Name: Alation
Author: Alation

The Alation AI Agent SDK enables AI agents to access and leverage metadata from the Alation Data Catalog.

Overview

This SDK empowers AI agents to:

Retrieve contextual information from Alation's Data Catalog
Use natural language to search for relevant metadata
Fetch bulk objects from catalog
Customize response formats using flexible signature specifications
Integrate seamlessly with AI frameworks like LangChain and MCP

Components

The project is organized into multiple components:

Core SDK - Foundation with API client and context tools
LangChain Integration - Adapters for the LangChain framework
MCP Integration - Server implementation for Model Context Protocol

Core SDK (`alation-ai-agent-sdk`)

The core SDK provides the foundation for interacting with the Alation API. It handles authentication, request formatting, and response parsing.

Learn more about the Core SDK

LangChain Integration (`alation-ai-agent-langchain`)

This component integrates the SDK with the LangChain framework, enabling the creation of sophisticated AI agents that can reason about your data catalog.

Learn more about the LangChain Integration

MCP Integration (`alation-ai-agent-mcp`)

The MCP integration provides an MCP-compatible server that exposes Alation's context capabilities to any MCP client.

Learn more about the MCP Integration

Getting Started

Prerequisites

Python 3.10 or higher
Access to an Alation Data Catalog instance
A valid refresh token or client_id and secret. For more details, refer to the Authentication Guide.

Installation

# Install core SDK
pip install alation-ai-agent-sdk

# Install LangChain integration
pip install alation-ai-agent-langchain

# Install MCP integration
pip install alation-ai-agent-mcp

Usage

The library needs to be configured with your Alation instance credentials. Depending on your authentication mode, you can use either UserAccountAuthParams or ServiceAccountAuthParams.

User Account Authentication

from alation_ai_agent_sdk import AlationAPI, UserAccountAuthParams

# Initialize the SDK with User Account Authentication
auth_params = UserAccountAuthParams(
    user_id=12345,  # Your numeric user ID
    refresh_token="your_refresh_token"
)
alation_api = AlationAPI(
    base_url="https://your-alation-instance.com",
    auth_method="user_account",
    auth_params=auth_params
)

Service Account Authentication

from alation_ai_agent_sdk import AlationAPI, ServiceAccountAuthParams

# Initialize the SDK with Service Account Authentication
auth_params = ServiceAccountAuthParams(
    client_id="your_client_id",
    client_secret="your_client_secret"
)
alation_api = AlationAPI(
    base_url="https://your-alation-instance.com",
    auth_method="service_account",
    auth_params=auth_params
)

Supported Tools

alation_context

A retrieval tool that pulls contextual information from the Alation catalog based on natural language queries.

Functionality

Accepts user questions in natural language
Performs query rewrites to optimize search results
Returns relevant catalog data in JSON format
Can return multiple object types in a single response

Usage

response = alation_ai_sdk.get_context(
    "What certified data set is used to make decisions on providing credit for customers?"
)

Input Parameters

question (string): The natural language query
signature (optional dict): The configuration controlling which objects and their fields

Returns

JSON-formatted response of relevant catalog objects

get_data_products

A retrieval tool that pulls data products from the Alation catalog based on product ID or natural language queries.

Functionality

Accepts product IDs for direct lookup
Accepts user queries in natural language for discovery
Returns relevant data products in JSON format
Can return single or multiple results

Usage

response = alation_ai_sdk.get_data_products(
    "12345"  # Example product ID
)

response = alation_ai_sdk.get_data_products(
    "Show me all data products related to sales"
)

Input Parameters

product_id (string, optional): The ID of the product for direct lookup
query (string, optional): A natural language query to discover data products

Returns

JSON-formatted response of relevant data products

Bulk Object Retrieval

Retrieve catalog objects without conversational queries:

# Get tables from a specific datasource
bulk_signature = {
    "table": {
        "fields_required": ["name", "description", "columns"],
        "search_filters": {
            "fields": {"ds": [123]}  # Specific datasource
        },
        "limit": 100,
        "child_objects": {
            "columns": {
                "fields": ["name", "data_type", "description"]
            }
        }
    }
}

response = sdk.bulk_retrieval(signature=bulk_signature)

Shape the SDK to your needs

The SDK's alation-context tool supports customizing response content using signatures. This powerful feature allows you to specify which fields to include and how to filter the catalog results. For instance:

# Define a signature for searching only tables that optionally
# include joins and filters if relevant to the user question
signature = {
    "table": {
        "fields_required": ["name", "title", "description"],
        "fields_optional": ["common_joins", "common_filters"]
    }
}

# Use the signature with your query
response = sdk.get_context(
    "What are our sales tables?",
    signature
)

For more information about signatures, refer to Using Signatures.

Guides and Example Agents

General

Planning an Integration - Practical considerations for getting the most out of your agents and the Alation Data Catalog.
Using Signatures - How to customize your agent with concrete examples.
Supported Object Types and Fields - See what's available.

Core SDK

Direct usage examples for the Alation AI Agent SDK:

Basic Usage Example - Simple example showing SDK initialization and context queries.
QA Chatbot Example - Interactive chatbot demonstrating conversation context and signature usage.

Model Context Protocol (MCP)

Enable agentic experiences with the Alation Data Catalog.

MCP Integration - Getting the Alation MCP server up and running.
Integration with Code Editors
Testing with MCP Inspector - Steps for debugging and verification.
Claude Desktop Integration - Leverage the Alation MCP server within Claude Desktop.
LibreChat Integration - Create assistants and agents alike.

LangChain

Harness the SDK to build complex agents and workflows.

LangChain Integration - How to integrate the SDK into your LangChain agents.
Basic Usage Example - A simple example.
Multi Agent Example - A multi agent workflow with several SDK integration points.

Integrating with other toolkits

The number of published agent frameworks and toolkits appears to be increasing every day. If you don't happen to see the framework or toolkit you're using here, it's still possible to adapt alation-ai-agent-sdk to your needs. It may be as simple as writing a wrapping function where a decorator is applied.

While we want to reach as many developers as possible and make it as convenient as possible, we anticipate a long tail distribution of toolkits and won't be able to write adapters for every case. If you'd like support for a specific toolkit, please create an issue to discuss.

Alation