/document-extraction

name: document-extraction
description: Use this skill for intelligent document processing and content extraction using LandingAI's Agentic Document Extraction (ADE). Trigger when users need to (1) Parse documents (PDFs, images, spreadsheets, presentations) into structured Markdown with layout understanding, (2) Extract specific structured data from documents using schemas (invoice fields, form data, table data, etc.), (3) Classify and separate multi-document batches by type (invoices vs receipts, statements vs forms, etc.), (4) Process large documents asynchronously (up to 1GB/1000 pages), (5) Get visual grounding (bounding boxes, page numbers) for extracted content — use when users mention bounding boxes, word locations, grounding, highlighting extracted content, or showing where data appears in a document. Use this skill when the task involves understanding document content for a set of documents. In particular this skill can help you write code that run on sets of documents. This will increase speed, and reduce the cost of loading the documents on the Agent context window because you can use a single script to extract the information needed.

Document Extraction (ADE)

Overview

LandingAI's Agentic Document Extraction (ADE) is a document processing SaaS that parses, extracts, and classifies documents without requiring templates or training. It provides three main capabilities:

1. **Parse**: Convert documents into structured Markdown with hierarchical JSON representation 2. **Extract**: Pull specific structured data using JSON schemas or Pydantic models 3. **Split**: Classify and separate multi-document batches by type

**Key Benefits:**

• No ML training or templates required
• Layout-agnostic parsing (works with any document structure)
• Supports 20+ file formats (PDF, images, spreadsheets, presentations)
• Precise visual grounding (bounding boxes, page numbers)
• Multiple models optimized for different document types

Quick Start

1. Installation

Never install packages globally without user approval. Always check for a local Python environment first.

1. .venv/bin/python       — uv-managed (this project)
2. venv/bin/python        — standard Python venv
3. uv run python          — if pyproject.toml exists
4. poetry run python      — if poetry.lock exists
5. python3                — system fallback; warn the user

Use the local environment to install: `landingai-ade`, `python-dotenv`

2. API Key Setup

The user may have already setup a `.env` file in the same directory as the `document-extraction` skill with the API key. You MUST check this path first (ls -la .*/skills/document-extraction/.env). Also try checking on the same directory as this SKILL.md file.

If not, provide instructions to create one. The script below will search for `.env` in common locations and load it.

.venv/bin/python - << 'EOF'
import os
from pathlib import Path
from dotenv import load_dotenv

# Load API key: prefer existing env var, then .env file lookup
if os.environ.get("VISION_AGENT_API_KEY"):
    print("API key found in existing environment variable")
else:
    def _find_env():
        for d in [Path.cwd().resolve(), *Path.cwd().resolve().parents]:
            for candidate in [
                # ADD the directory where the document-extraction skill is located
                d / '.env',
                d / 'document-extraction/.env',
                d / 'skills/document-extraction/.env',
            ]:
                if candidate.is_file():
                    return candidate
        return None
    env = _find_env()
    if env:
        load_dotenv(env)
        print(f"API key loaded from: {env}")
    else:
        print("Warning: VISION_AGENT_API_KEY not set and no .env found")
EOF

If not key is found instruct the user to get an API key from [https://va.landing.ai/settings/api-key](https://va.landing.ai/settings/api-key)

Copy `.env-sample` to `.env` and add your API key:

cp .env-sample .env

Edit `.env` and add your key:

VISION_AGENT_API_KEY=your_actual_api_key_here

**Note:** The `.env` file is gitignored for security. Advanced users can also set the environment variable directly: `export VISION_AGENT_API_KEY=<your-key>`

**EU Endpoint:** If using the EU endpoint, set `environment="eu"` when initializing the client.

3. Basic Parse Example

from dotenv import load_dotenv
load_dotenv()  # Load API key from .env

from landingai_ade import LandingAIADE
from pathlib import Path

client = LandingAIADE()

# Parse a document
response = client.parse(
    document=Path("document.pdf"),
    model="dpt-2-latest"
)

# Access results
print(f"Pages: {response.metadata.page_count}")
print(f"Chunks: {len(response.chunks)}")
print("\nMarkdown output:")
print(response.markdown[:500])  # First 500 chars

# Save Markdown for extraction
with open("output.md", "w", encoding="utf-8") as f:
    f.write(response.markdown)

4. Basic Extract Example

from dotenv import load_dotenv
load_dotenv()

from landingai_ade import LandingAIADE
from landingai_ade.lib import pydantic_to_json_schema
from pydantic import BaseModel, Field
from pathlib import Path

# Define extraction schema using Pydantic
class Invoice(BaseModel):
    invoice_number: str = Field(description="Invoice number")
    invoice_date: str = Field(description="Invoice date")
    total_amount: float = Field(description="Total amount in USD")
    vendor_name: str = Field(description="Vendor name")

# Convert to JSON schema
schema = pydantic_to_json_schema(Invoice)

client = LandingAIADE()

# Extract from parsed markdown
response = client.extract(
    schema=schema,
    markdown=Path("output.md"),  # From parse step
    model="extract-latest"
)

# Access extracted data
print(response.extraction)
# Output: {'invoice_number': 'INV-12345', 'invoice_date': '2024-01-15', ...}

# Check extraction metadata (traceability)
print(response.extraction_metadata)

Document Parsing