Network API Interception

Smart Network API Interception is a unique RTILA X feature that lets you extract data from a website’s background API calls instead of parsing the HTML.

Why Use Network Interception?

Many modern websites load data via JavaScript API calls (XHR/Fetch). Instead of scraping the rendered HTML, you can intercept the API responses directly. This gives you:

• Cleaner data — No HTML parsing needed
• More reliable — API responses have consistent structure
• Faster — No need to wait for full page rendering
• Bypasses DOM changes — Works even if the HTML structure changes

How It Works

1. Enable Network API Interception in project settings (Advanced tab).
2. Run the project with 0 datasets and 0 commands.
3. RTILA X navigates to the page and listens for API responses.
4. When it finds a JSON API response with useful data, it auto-generates datasets and extraction commands.
5. The generated project is ready to run.

Example Workflow

1. Create a new project.
2. Set the starting URL to https://example.com/products.
3. In Settings → Advanced, enable Smart Network API Interception.
4. Leave datasets and commands empty.
5. Run the project.
6. RTILA X detects an API call to /api/v1/products returning JSON.
7. It auto-generates a dataset with properties matching the JSON fields.
8. The project is updated with the generated configuration.

Supported Data Types

The interception engine detects:

• XHR requests (XMLHttpRequest)
• Fetch API calls
• JSON responses

Limitations

• Only works with JSON API responses.
• The API must be called during page load (not lazy-loaded on user interaction).
• Some APIs may require authentication headers.

Combining with DOM Scraping

You can use Network Interception for initial data discovery, then switch to DOM scraping for specific elements that aren’t available via API.