azure-ai-contentunderstanding-py

Files (3)

• SKILL.md
• capabilities.md · references/
• non-hero-scenarios.md · references/

SKILL.md (first lines)

# Azure AI Content Understanding SDK for Python

Multimodal AI service that extracts semantic content from documents, video, audio, and image files for RAG and automated workflows.

## Installation

```bash
pip install azure-ai-contentunderstanding
```

## Environment Variables

```bash
CONTENTUNDERSTANDING_ENDPOINT=https://<resource>.cognitiveservices.azure.com/  # Required for all auth methods
AZURE_TOKEN_CREDENTIALS=prod # Required only if DefaultAzureCredential is used in production
```

## Authentication & Lifecycle

> **🔑 Two rules apply to every code sample below:**
>
> 1. **Prefer `DefaultAzureCredential`.** It works locally (Azure CLI / VS Code / Developer CLI) and in Azure (managed identity, workload identity) with no code change. Avoid connection strings, account/API keys — they bypass Entra audit and rotation.
>    - Local dev: `DefaultAzureCredential` works as-is.
>    - Production: set `AZURE_TOKEN_CREDENTIALS=prod` (or `AZURE_TOKEN_CREDENTIALS=<specific_credential>`) to constrain the credential chain to production-safe credentials.
> 2. **Wrap every client in a context manager** so HTTP transports, sockets, and token caches are released deterministically:
>    - Sync: `with <Client>(...) as client:`
>    - Async: `async with <Client>(...) as client:` **and** `async with DefaultAzureCredential() as credential:` (from `azure.identity.aio`)
>
> Snippets may abbreviate this setup, but production code should always follow both rules.

```python
import os
from azure.ai.contentunderstanding import ContentUnderstandingClient
from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential, ManagedIdentityCredential

endpoint = os.environ["CONTENTUNDERSTANDING_ENDPOINT"]
# Local dev: DefaultAzureCredential. Production: set AZURE_TOKEN_CREDENTIALS=prod or AZURE_TOKEN_CREDENTIALS=<specific_credential>
credential = DefaultAzureCredential(require_envvar=True)
# Or use a specific credential directly in production:
# See https://learn.microsoft.com/python/api/overview/azure/identity-readme?view=azure-python#credential-classes
# credential = ManagedIdentityCredential()
with ContentUnderstandingClient(endpoint=endpoint, credential=credential) as client:
    analyzers = list(client.list_analyzers())
```

## Core Workflow

Content Understanding operations are asynchronous long-running operations:

1. **Begin Analysis** — Start the analysis operation with `begin_analyze()` (returns a poller)
2. **Poll for Results** — Poll until analysis completes (SDK handles this with `.result()`)
3. **Process Results** — Extract structured results from `AnalyzeResult.contents`

## Prebuilt Analyzers

| Analyzer | Content Type | Purpose |
|----------|--------------|---------|
| `prebuilt-documentSearch` | Documents | Extract markdown for RAG applications |
| `prebuilt-imageSearch` | Images | Extract content from images |
| `prebuilt-audioSearch` | Audio | Transcribe audio with timing |
| `prebuilt-videoSearch` | Video | Extract frames, transcripts, summaries |
| `prebuilt-invoice` | Documents | Extract invoice fields |

## Analyze Document

```python
import os
from azure.ai.contentunderstanding import ContentUnderstandingClient
from azure.ai.contentunderstanding.models import AnalyzeInput
from azure.identity import DefaultAzureCredential

endpoint = os.environ["CONTENTUNDERSTANDING_ENDPOINT"]
with ContentUnderstandingClient(
    endpoint=endpoint,
    credential=DefaultAzureCredential()
) as client:
    # Analyze document from URL
    poller = client.begin_analyze(
        analyzer_id="prebuilt-documentSearch",
        inputs=[AnalyzeInput(url="https://example.com/document.pdf")]
    )

    result = poller.result()

    # Access markdown content (contents is a list)
    content = result.contents[0]
    print(content.markdown)
```

## Access Document Content Details

```python
from azure.ai.contentunderstanding.models import MediaContentKind, DocumentContent

content = result.contents[0]
if content.kind == MediaContentKind.DOCUMENT:
    document_content: DocumentContent = content  # type: ignore
    print(document_content.start_page_number)
```

## Analyze Image

```python
from azure.ai.contentunderstanding.models import AnalyzeInput

poller = client.begin_analyze(
    analyzer_id="prebuilt-imageSearch",
    inputs=[AnalyzeInput(url="https://example.com/image.jpg")]
)
result = poller.result()
content = result.contents[0]
print(content.markdown)
```

## Analyze Video

```python
from azure.ai.contentunderstanding.models import AnalyzeInput

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