AAO Directory API

The AAO directory at agenticadvertising.org indexes publisher adagents.json files across the open web. This API surfaces the inverse map every sales-agent operator needs at sync time:

“What publishers have authorized my agent?”

Without this endpoint, operators have to either maintain the publisher domain list manually and call fetch_agent_authorizations against it, or crawl the open web themselves. Both are infeasible at managed-network scale (cafemedia alone delegates ~6,800 publisher domains under a single manager file). This endpoint is discovery, not authorization. The publisher’s own adagents.json remains the trust root. The directory tells you which publishers to verify directly via the SDK’s per-domain primitives (verify_agent_authorization, fetch_agent_authorizations).

Endpoint

GET https://{aao_directory}/v1/agents/{agent_url}/publishers

{agent_url} MUST be percent-encoded. The directory canonicalizes the lookup key (lowercase host, default port stripped, trailing slash on path component normalized) using the same convention the SDK applies in verify_agent_authorization.

Query parameters

Parameter	Type	Default	Semantics
`since`	ISO 8601	unset	Return only publishers whose `last_verified_at` ≥ `since`. Enables incremental sync.
`cursor`	opaque string	unset	Pagination cursor returned by a prior response. Stable across the directory’s refresh cycle for the lifetime of the cursor.
`status`	string, repeated	`authorized`	Filter by lifecycle status. v1: `authorized`, `revoked`. Repeat the key once per value (OpenAPI `style: form, explode: true`). Comma-separated single-value form (`status=authorized,revoked`) is not accepted; directories MUST return `400` with an explanation pointing to the repeated-key form.
`limit`	int (1–1000)	200	Max publishers per page.

Worked example: filtering by multiple status values

GET /v1/agents/https%3A%2F%2Fsales-agent.example.com%2F/publishers?status=authorized&status=revoked&limit=500

Equivalent in TypeScript:

const url = new URL(`${directory}/v1/agents/${encodeURIComponent(agentUrl)}/publishers`);
url.searchParams.append("status", "authorized");
url.searchParams.append("status", "revoked");
url.searchParams.set("limit", "500");

Equivalent in Python (requests):

requests.get(
    f"{directory}/v1/agents/{quote(agent_url, safe='')}/publishers",
    params=[("status", "authorized"), ("status", "revoked"), ("limit", "500")],
)

The OpenAPI fragment for the status parameter:

- in: query
  name: status
  schema:
    type: array
    items:
      type: string
      enum: [authorized, revoked]
  style: form
  explode: true
  required: false

Repeated-key was chosen because (a) it is what URLSearchParams.append() and OpenAPI’s default explode: true produce, (b) it composes cleanly with future values that might contain a comma, and (c) it leaves no parser ambiguity at the directory.

Response

{
  "agent_url": "https://sales-agent.example.com",
  "directory_indexed_at": "2026-05-19T12:00:00Z",
  "publishers": [
    {
      "publisher_domain": "recipeswithessentialoils.com",
      "discovery_method": "ads_txt_managerdomain",
      "manager_domain": "cafemedia.com",
      "properties_authorized": 1,
      "properties_total": 1,
      "signing_keys_pinned": false,
      "status": "authorized",
      "last_verified_at": "2026-05-19T08:00:00Z"
    },
    {
      "publisher_domain": "wsj.com",
      "discovery_method": "direct",
      "manager_domain": null,
      "properties_authorized": 47,
      "properties_total": 200,
      "signing_keys_pinned": true,
      "status": "authorized",
      "last_verified_at": "2026-05-19T10:00:00Z"
    },
    {
      "publisher_domain": "former-partner.example",
      "discovery_method": "authoritative_location",
      "manager_domain": "cafemedia.com",
      "properties_authorized": 0,
      "properties_total": 0,
      "signing_keys_pinned": false,
      "status": "revoked",
      "last_verified_at": "2026-05-19T11:00:00Z"
    }
  ],
  "next_cursor": "eyJv..."
}

Field reference

Envelope

Field	Required	Notes
`agent_url`	yes	Canonicalized echo of the lookup key.
`directory_indexed_at`	yes	Most recent per-publisher refresh in the result set. Provenance for the consumer’s own cache. NULL on empty pages — there’s no anchor to report; consumers SHOULD NOT advance cache freshness from a null value.
`publishers`	yes	Array. Empty array is a valid response — the directory has indexed this agent but no current authorizations resolve.
`next_cursor`	optional	Opaque pagination cursor; absent or null on the terminal page.

`PublisherEntry`

Field	Required	Notes
`publisher_domain`	yes	Publisher whose `adagents.json` authorizes the agent.
`discovery_method`	yes	`direct`, `authoritative_location`, `adagents_authoritative`, or `ads_txt_managerdomain`. See below.
`manager_domain`	conditional	Required when `discovery_method` ≠ `direct`. Null otherwise.
`properties_authorized`	yes	Count of properties under this publisher_domain only that the agent’s selectors resolve to. Never a network-wide count.
`properties_total`	yes	Count of properties under this publisher_domain only in the publisher’s file (or parent file’s inline subset for that domain). Never a network-wide count.
`signing_keys_pinned`	optional	Whether the publisher pins `signing_keys[]` on this agent. When `true`, agent’s signed responses MUST verify against the pinned set regardless of the agent’s own JWKS.
`status`	yes	`authorized` or `revoked`. See below.
`last_verified_at`	yes	When the directory last fetched and validated this publisher’s `adagents.json`.

`discovery_method` values

Value	Meaning	Trust profile
`direct`	Agent listed in the publisher’s own `/.well-known/adagents.json`.	Strongest — no delegation hops.
`authoritative_location`	Publisher’s `/.well-known/adagents.json` declared `authoritative_location` pointing to a manager file that lists the agent.	Strong — publisher actively delegated.
`adagents_authoritative`	Discovered via the manager file’s own `properties[]` carrying the publisher’s domain (per adcp#4825 inline resolution rule).	Medium — publisher named in manager file but didn’t host the delegation themselves.
`ads_txt_managerdomain`	Discovered via the publisher’s `ads.txt` `MANAGERDOMAIN=` directive pointing to the manager file.	Weakest — the `managerdomain` fallback safety rule is the only positive cross-check.

The directory verifies the managerdomain safety rule before returning a row with discovery_method: ads_txt_managerdomain — this is the directory’s main value-add over a per-operator ads.txt crawl.

`status` values

Value	Meaning
`authorized`	Selector resolves to ≥ 1 property under this publisher_domain. The normal case.
`revoked`	Publisher previously authorized the agent and now lists this `publisher_domain` in `revoked_publisher_domains[]` of an authoritative file. Emitted as a tombstone on the first sync after revocation lands, then dropped. Lets operators propagate revocations without polling each publisher’s cache TTL.

unbound, pending, unreachable, and no_properties are intentionally not part of v1. The directory only indexes publishers whose adagents.json was successfully fetched and references the agent. If a publisher disappears, the directory drops it from results rather than returning a tombstone (consumers track membership via set-diff against prior pages).

HTTP semantics

Status	Meaning
`200 OK`	Lookup succeeded. Body MAY have empty `publishers[]`.
`400 Bad Request`	Malformed `agent_url`, invalid cursor, unknown `status` value, or `status` supplied as a comma-separated list rather than repeated keys.
`404 Not Found`	Directory has never indexed any publisher referencing this `agent_url`. Distinct from `200` + empty (which means the directory has indexed this agent, but no current authorizations resolve).
`429 Too Many Requests`	Rate limit. `Retry-After` header set. Bucket key: `agent_url` (anonymous) plus IP (defense-in-depth).
`5xx`	Directory error. Consumer SHOULD retry with backoff.

The endpoint sets Cache-Control and ETag. Conditional GET (If-None-Match) is the wire-level cache mechanism; directory_indexed_at in the body is the freshness anchor for consumer logic.

Authentication

V1 is unauthenticated. Publisher adagents.json files are public; the inverse map is public. If rate-limiting graduates from IP-based to identity-based, the path is a separate RFC layering RFC 9421 request signing keyed off the agent’s published JWKS — the agent proves it controls agent_url by signing the request. Out of scope for this RFC.

Pagination

Cursors are opaque. Treat them as substitutable strings and pass them back verbatim. The directory MAY change cursor format without notice; consumers MUST NOT parse cursor contents. A cursor remains valid for at least one directory refresh cycle. Past that, the directory MAY return 400 with cursor_expired or 200 with re-traversal from the start — both are conforming. Consumers SHOULD record the wall-clock time of the prior request and refuse to use cursors older than 24 hours.

Relationship to other primitives

The AAO directory complements the existing SDK primitives:

Question	Primitive	Direction
Is this agent listed in this publisher’s `adagents.json`?	`verify_agent_authorization(adagents_data, agent_url)`	Push (publisher → agent)
Given a list of publishers, which authorize my agent?	`fetch_agent_authorizations(agent_url, publisher_domains)`	Pull, caller-supplied list
Which publishers authorize my agent?	`GET /v1/agents/{agent_url}/publishers`	Pull, directory-supplied list

The first two answer questions where the operator already knows the publisher set. The directory endpoint answers the operator’s actual sync-time question: “what’s my publisher set?” The recommended workflow:

Call GET /v1/agents/{agent_url}/publishers to discover the publisher set.
For each publisher_domain in the response, the operator MAY call verify_agent_authorization against the publisher’s own adagents.json to re-confirm against the trust root. The directory’s last_verified_at reduces but does not eliminate the need for per-domain verification on critical paths.
Use the response’s properties_authorized / properties_total for operator-facing scope summaries, and the signing_keys_pinned flag to surface which agents must publish a JWKS matching the publisher’s pin.

Relationship to `publisher_properties` inline resolution

On managed-network-shape parent files (per adcp#4825 inline resolution rule), the directory computes properties_total from the parent file’s inline properties[] filtered by publisher_domain. Strict federation at this scale would require N HTTP fetches per directory refresh per publisher — the same scale problem operators have, moved one layer up. The directory uses the inline resolution rule the spec endorses.

Out of scope (v1)

Authentication. Public endpoint, anonymous rate limiting. Identity-bound limits arrive in a separate RFC if needed.
Cross-directory federation. Single directory. The endpoint shape is defined such that multiple AAO-compatible directories could implement it; discovery of which directory to query is configuration today.
Push notification of new authorizations. Poll-based v1.
Inline property detail. properties_authorized / properties_total are counts only; full property lists arrive via a future ?include=properties if operators ask.

Getting Started

Building with AdCP

Protocol

Using AAO

FAQ

Trust & Security

Reference

Certification

AAO Directory API — Agent ↔ Publisher Inverse Lookup

AAO Directory API

Endpoint

Query parameters

Worked example: filtering by multiple status values

Response

Field reference

Envelope

`PublisherEntry`

`discovery_method` values

`status` values

HTTP semantics

Authentication

Relationship to other primitives

Relationship to `publisher_properties` inline resolution

Out of scope (v1)

See also

Getting Started

Building with AdCP

Protocol

Using AAO

FAQ

Trust & Security

Reference

Certification

Documentation Index

​AAO Directory API

​Endpoint

​Query parameters

​Worked example: filtering by multiple status values

​Response

​Field reference

​Envelope

​PublisherEntry

​discovery_method values

​status values

​HTTP semantics

​Authentication

​Pagination

​Relationship to other primitives

​Relationship to publisher_properties inline resolution

​Out of scope (v1)

​See also

AAO Directory API

Endpoint

Query parameters

Worked example: filtering by multiple status values

Response

Field reference

Envelope

`PublisherEntry`

`discovery_method` values

`status` values

HTTP semantics

Authentication

Pagination

Relationship to other primitives

Relationship to `publisher_properties` inline resolution

Out of scope (v1)

See also