API references

Display HTTP snippets

HTTP snippets allow users to see API request examples using common HTTP clients

HTTP code snippet selector

Setup

  1. Ensure you have a paid Fern subscription
  2. Contact support to request HTTP snippets activation
  3. Once enabled, build your production docs

Currently, HTTP snippets are provided as an all-or-nothing set. You cannot configure which languages are displayed. If you would like this feature, please open a GitHub issue.

How It Works

Request Examples

To generate HTTP snippets, add request examples to your API definition:

Set Default Snippet Language

HTTP snippets support several languages. Our development work is driven by customer requests, so please request support for languages not listed here by opening an issue.

  • csharp
  • curl
  • dotnet
  • go
  • java
  • python
  • ruby
  • typescript

To set the default snippet language, use the default-language key at the top indentation level of docs.yml.

docs.yml
1default-language: typescript
2
3navigation:
4  - api: API Reference
5    snippets:
6      python: your-package-name
7      typescript: your-package-name

Generated Features

HTTP snippets automatically include:

  • Authentication headers with placeholders (e.g., <apiKey>)
  • Query parameters and request body formatting
  • Content-Type headers
  • Error handling patterns
  • SSL/TLS configuration where applicable

Display Behavior

  • If your API has SDK snippets, those will be shown by default
  • If no SDK snippets exist, HTTP snippets will display automatically
  • User language preferences are saved client-side

To see HTTP snippets in action, check out Humanloop’s API documentation for a live example of how they appear in production documentation.