superdoc-sdk 1.0.0a23

SuperDoc SDK (CLI-backed)

superdoc-sdk

Programmatic SDK for deterministic DOCX operations through SuperDoc's Document API.

Install

pip install superdoc-sdk

The package installs a platform-specific CLI companion package automatically via PEP 508 environment markers. Supported platforms:

Platform	Architecture
macOS	Apple Silicon (arm64), Intel (x64)
Linux	x64, ARM64
Windows	x64

Quick start

from superdoc import SuperDocClient

with SuperDocClient() as client:
    client.doc.open({"doc": "./contract.docx"})

    info = client.doc.info({})
    print(info["counts"])

    results = client.doc.find({"type": "text", "pattern": "termination"})
    target = results["items"][0]["context"]["textRanges"][0]

    client.doc.replace({"target": target, "text": "expiration"})
    client.doc.save({"inPlace": True})
    client.doc.close({})

Async

import asyncio
from superdoc import AsyncSuperDocClient

async def main():
    async with AsyncSuperDocClient() as client:
        await client.doc.open({"doc": "./contract.docx"})

        info = await client.doc.info({})
        print(info["counts"])

        results = await client.doc.find({"type": "text", "pattern": "termination"})
        target = results["items"][0]["context"]["textRanges"][0]

        await client.doc.replace({"target": target, "text": "expiration"})
        await client.doc.save({"inPlace": True})
        await client.doc.close({})

asyncio.run(main())

Client lifecycle

The SDK uses a persistent host process for all operations. The host is started on first use and reused across calls, avoiding per-operation subprocess overhead.

Context managers (recommended)

# Sync
with SuperDocClient() as client:
    client.doc.find({"query": "test"})

# Async
async with AsyncSuperDocClient() as client:
    await client.doc.find({"query": "test"})

The context manager calls connect() on entry and dispose() on exit (including on exception).

Explicit lifecycle

client = SuperDocClient()
client.connect()      # Optional — first invoke() auto-connects
result = client.doc.find({"query": "test"})
client.dispose()      # Shuts down the host process

connect() is optional. If not called explicitly, the first operation triggers a lazy connection to the host process.

Configuration

client = SuperDocClient(
    startup_timeout_ms=10_000,    # Max time for host handshake (default: 5000)
    shutdown_timeout_ms=5_000,    # Max time for graceful shutdown (default: 5000)
    request_timeout_ms=60_000,    # Per-operation timeout passed to CLI (default: None)
    watchdog_timeout_ms=30_000,   # Client-side safety timer per request (default: 30000)
    default_change_mode="tracked", # Auto-inject changeMode for mutations (default: None)
    env={"SUPERDOC_CLI_BIN": "/path/to/superdoc"},  # Environment overrides
)

Thread safety

Client instances are serialized: one operation at a time per client. For parallelism, use multiple client instances. Do not share a single client across threads.

API

Client

from superdoc import SuperDocClient

client = SuperDocClient()

All document operations are on client.doc:

client.doc.open(params)
client.doc.find(params)
client.doc.insert(params)
# ... etc

Operations

Category	Operations
Query	find, get_node, get_node_by_id, info
Mutation	insert, replace, delete
Format	format.bold, format.italic, format.underline, format.strikethrough
Create	create.paragraph
Lists	lists.list, lists.get, lists.insert, lists.create, lists.attach, lists.detach, lists.indent, lists.outdent, lists.join, lists.separate, lists.set_level, lists.set_value, lists.continue_previous, lists.set_level_restart, lists.convert_to_text, lists.can_join, lists.can_continue_previous
Comments	comments.create, comments.patch, comments.delete, comments.get, comments.list
Track Changes	track_changes.list, track_changes.get, track_changes.decide
Lifecycle	open, save, close
Session	session.list, session.save, session.close, session.set_default
Introspection	status, describe, describe_command

Collaboration

The Python SDK supports realtime collaboration through the same host transport as the Node SDK. Pass collaboration parameters to doc.open:

with SuperDocClient() as client:
    client.doc.open({
        "doc": "./contract.docx",
        "collabUrl": "ws://localhost:4000",
        "collabDocumentId": "my-doc-id",
    })
    # Operations now use the collaborative session
    client.doc.find({"query": "test"})
    client.doc.close({})

Troubleshooting

Custom CLI binary

If you need to use a custom-built CLI binary (e.g. a newer version or a patched build), set the SUPERDOC_CLI_BIN environment variable:

export SUPERDOC_CLI_BIN=/path/to/superdoc

Debug logging

Enable transport-level debug logging to diagnose connectivity issues:

export SUPERDOC_DEBUG=1

Air-gapped / private index environments

Mirror both superdoc-sdk and the superdoc-sdk-cli-* package for your platform to your private index. For example, on macOS ARM64:

pip download superdoc-sdk superdoc-sdk-cli-darwin-arm64
# Upload both wheels to your private index

Part of SuperDoc

This SDK is part of SuperDoc — an open source document editor bringing Microsoft Word to the web.

License

AGPL-3.0 · Enterprise license available