---
title: "Overview DataEngine Runtime SDK"
slug: "overview-dataengine-runtime-sdk"
tags: ["5.5", "DataEngine"]
updated: 2026-10-28T00:38:32Z
published: 2026-10-28T00:38:32Z
canonical: "docs.vastdata.com/overview-dataengine-runtime-sdk"
---

> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.vastdata.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Overview DataEngine Runtime SDK

The VAST DataEngine Runtime relays events, context information, and responses between VAST DataEngine and your function. The VAST DataEngine Runtime SDK is a python SDK that handles event processing as single events or batches, conditional routing of events to functions in a pipeline, deployment and visualization of OpenTelemetry logging and tracing, access to secrets and environment variables that are configured in the pipeline or specific function, and collection and measurement of custom metrics.

The DataEngine runtime is accessible from within functions that you initialize with VAST DataEngine as described in the [DataEngine User Guide](/docs-5-5/docs/dataengine-user-guide). The runtime extracts its configuration from environment variables configured for each deployed pipeline or function. Explicitly installing the runtime SDK supports custom dependencies.