claude-api-reference

What problem does it solve?

Provide a practical, developer-focused reference that accelerates building Claude API integrations for messaging, vision, PDF processing, tool use, streaming, and batch workflows while reducing errors and integration time.

Core Features & Use Cases

• API patterns & headers: Clear guidance for constructing requests, required headers, and model selection strategies.
• File and image handling: Best practices for base64 uploads, Files API usage, size and page limits, and mixed-media messages.
• Streaming, batching & tool use: Examples for streaming responses, async handling, batch jobs for cost savings, and function-calling/tool integrations with retry and error strategies.
• Developer examples: Ready-to-run Python scripts for interactive chat, PDF analysis, and streaming handlers to bootstrap real-world integrations.

Quick Start

Use the claude-api-reference to implement a Python endpoint that uploads a PDF, encodes it to base64, calls Claude messages.create with a document message, and returns a concise summary.