Introduction to using Python to call our API

Introduction to Making API Calls with Python

What is an API?

An API (Application Programming Interface) is a set of protocols and tools that allows different software applications to communicate with each other. APIs are used to retrieve data or perform actions from a remote server, such as getting weather information, searching for products on an e-commerce site, or accessing financial data.

How to Make an API Call with Python

Making an API call with Python is a simple process. First, you need to import the requests module, which allows you to send HTTP requests using Python.

import requests

Once you have imported the requests module, you can use the get() method to send a GET request to the API endpoint. The get() method takes a URL as its argument and returns a Response object.

response = requests.get(url)

You can then access the data returned by the API by calling the content attribute of the Response object.

data = response.content

You can also check the status code of the response to see if the request was successful. A status code of 200 means the request was successful, while a status code of 404 means the requested resource was not found.

if response.status_code == 200:
    # Do something with the data
  else:
    print("Error:", response.status_code)

Finally, you can calculate the elapsed time of the API call by recording the start and end times of the request and subtracting them. You can use the time module to record the start and end times in milliseconds.

import time

  start_time = time.time()

  # Make the API call and process the response

  end_time = time.time()
  elapsed_time = (end_time - start_time) * 1000

  print(f"Elapsed time: {elapsed_time:.2f} milliseconds")

Example: Making an API Call to Retrieve Options Data for TSLA

Let’s put these concepts into practice by making an API call to retrieve options data for TSLA (Tesla Inc.). We will use the Delta Neutral API, which provides end-of-day options data for a variety of underlying assets.

The API endpoint we will use is:

https://api.deltaneutral.net/eod-options-details/TSLA/2023-03-06/2023-03-24/2023-06-06/json/40000?apikey=DEMOAPIKEY

This endpoint returns options data for TSLA for the date of March 6th, 2023 with an expiration date of March 24th, 2023. We will use the requests module to send a GET request to this endpoint and calculate the elapsed time of the request.

import requests
import time

start_time = time.time()

url = "https://api.deltaneutral.net/eod-options-details/TSLA/2023-03-06/2023-03-24/2023-05-05/json/40000?apikey=DEMOAPIKEY"
response = requests.get(url)

data_length = len(response.content)

end_time = time.time()
elapsed_time = (end_time - start_time) * 1000

print(f"Data length: {data_length} bytes")
print(f"Elapsed time: {elapsed_time:.2f} milliseconds")