Getting started with risAT • risAT

What is risAT?

risAT provides a tidyverse-friendly interface to the Austrian RIS (Rechtsinformationssystem) Open Government Data REST API v2.6. It covers the /Judikatur endpoint (case law / jurisprudence) across all supported court applications and is designed for reproducible legal research.

Installation

# install.packages("pak")
pak::pak("werkstattcodes/risAT")

Quick search

The easiest way to search is with a court-specific wrapper. Each wrapper targets a single court application and provides typed, validated arguments:

library(risAT)

# Search the Administrative Court (VwGH) for decisions about "Baurecht"
results <- ris_search_vwgh(query = "Baurecht")
results

All search functions return a tibble. Key columns include id, application, decision_date, case_number, document_type, and two list-columns: content_urls (download links) and app_metadata (court-specific fields and response metadata).

Available court wrappers

risAT provides convenience wrappers for the most commonly used Judikatur applications:

Court / Application	Function
VfGH (Constitutional Court)	`ris_search_vfgh()`
VwGH (Administrative Court)	`ris_search_vwgh()`
Justiz (OGH, OLG, LG, BG)	`ris_search_justiz()`
BVwG (Federal Administrative Court)	`ris_search_bvwg()`
LVwG (State Administrative Courts)	`ris_search_lvwg()`
DSK / DSB (Data Protection)	`ris_search_dsk()`
DOK (Disciplinary Bodies)	`ris_search_dok()`
PVAK (Staff Representation)	`ris_search_pvak()`
GBK (Equal Treatment Commission)	`ris_search_gbk()`

Plus a generic function that accepts all RIS Judikatur application codes and English aliases documented in ?ris_req_case_law:

results <- ris_search_case_law(
  application = "data_protection",
  query = "DSGVO"
)

Filtering results

All wrappers accept common filter arguments:

results <- ris_search_vwgh(
  query = "Asyl",
  decision_date_from = "2024-01-01",
  decision_date_to = "2024-06-30",
  decision_type = "Erkenntnis"
)

Some courts have additional parameters. For example, ris_search_justiz() accepts court, legal_area, and specialist_area:

results <- ris_search_justiz(
  query = "Schadenersatz",
  court = "OGH"
)

The two-step pattern

Under the hood, each search wrapper calls two lower-level functions:

ris_req_case_law() – builds an httr2 request object
ris_perform_case_law() – executes it with automatic pagination

You can use these directly for more control:

# Build the request (no network call yet)
req <- ris_req_case_law(
  application = "Vwgh",
  query = "Baurecht"
)

# Inspect the URL before sending
req$url

# Execute with pagination
results <- ris_perform_case_law(req)

Pagination

The RIS API returns results in pages. risAT handles pagination automatically and fetches all available pages in scope. Pagination metadata for each row is stored in the app_metadata list-column under response (API response info) and request (request provenance):

# Total hit count reported by the API
results$app_metadata[[1]]$response$hits

# Current response page metadata
results$app_metadata[[1]]$response$page_number
results$app_metadata[[1]]$response$page_size

# Request provenance metadata attached by risAT
results$app_metadata[[1]]$request$seitennummer
results$app_metadata[[1]]$request$dokumente_pro_seite

Working with results

The output tibble is designed for use with dplyr and tidyr:

library(dplyr)

results |>
  filter(decision_date >= "2024-01-01") |>
  select(id, case_number, decision_date, decision_type)

Content download URLs are stored as a character vector in the content_urls list-column:

# Get URLs for the first result
results$content_urls[[1]]

Verifying results with echo

Whenever relevant and feasible, risAT search functions provide the option to echo the query to the console. Setting echo = TRUE prints the search arguments and the corresponding URL on the RIS website that produces the same results.

This serves three purposes:

Verification – open the URL in a browser to double-check that the results returned by risAT match the official RIS website.
Sharing – copy the URL to share a specific query with colleagues who may not use R.
Exploration – use the RIS website interface to explore the data interactively before refining your programmatic query.

results <- ris_search_vwgh(
  query = "Baurecht",
  decision_date_from = "2024-01-01",
  echo = TRUE
)

The printed output includes the total number of hits and a clickable URL pointing to the equivalent search on www.ris.bka.gv.at. The URL preserves all filter parameters (query, date range, decision type, etc.) so the browser results correspond exactly to the API results.

All court-specific wrappers and ris_search_case_law() support the echo argument.

Column name reference

The RIS API returns metadata in German. risAT translates these to English column names. The tables below document all columns grouped by scope, showing the English column name used by risAT, the original German API field, and a short description. Columns not listed here are passed through in their original snake_case form.

Common columns

These columns appear across most or all court applications.

Column	German source field	Description
`id`	`Technisch > ID`	Unique RIS document identifier
`application`	`Technisch > Applikation`	RIS application code (e.g. `"Vwgh"`, `"Justiz"`)
`authority`	`Technisch > Organ`	Issuing authority / court name
`published`	`Allgemein > Veroeffentlicht`	Publication date
`modified`	`Allgemein > Geaendert`	Last modification date
`document_url`	`Allgemein > DokumentUrl`	RIS web page URL for the document
`document_type`	`Dokumenttyp`	Document type (`"Rechtssatz"`, `"Entscheidungstext"`, etc.)
`case_number`	`Geschaeftszahl`	Business / case number
`norms`	`Normen`	Referenced legal norms (list-column)
`decision_date`	`Entscheidungsdatum`	Decision date
`keywords`	`Schlagworte`	Keywords / index terms
`ecli`	`EuropeanCaseLawIdentifier`	ECLI identifier
`full_decision_url`	`GesamteEntscheidungUrl`	URL to the full decision page
`legal_principles_url`	`RechtssaetzeUrl`	URL to the legal principles page
`decision_text_url`	`EntscheidungstextUrl`	URL to the decision text
`content_urls`	`Dokumentliste > ContentReference`	Content download URLs (list-column)
`app_metadata`	—	Package-generated metadata (list-column)

VwGH (Administrative Court)

Column	Description
`vwgh_decision_type`	Decision type (Beschluss, Erkenntnis, etc.)
`vwgh_court`	Court name
`vwgh_indices`	Legal index entries (list-column)
`vwgh_collection_number`	Official collection number (VwSlg)
`vwgh_document_number_type`	Document number type code
`vwgh_primary_legal_principle_number`	Primary legal principle number
`vwgh_legal_principle_number`	Legal principle number
`vwgh_primary_principle_reference`	Reference to the primary legal principle
`vwgh_legal_principle_chain_url`	URL to the legal principle chain
`vwgh_note`	Editorial notes (Beachte)
`vwgh_court_decisions`	Related court decisions (list-column)

VfGH (Constitutional Court)

Column	Description
`vfgh_decision_type`	Decision type (Beschluss, Erkenntnis, Vergleich)
`vfgh_court`	Court name
`vfgh_indices`	Legal index entries (list-column)
`vfgh_collection_number`	Official collection number (VfSlg)
`vfgh_headnote`	Headnote / guiding principle
`vfgh_decision_texts`	Linked decision texts (list-column)
`vfgh_decision_text_case_number`	Case number of linked decision text
`vfgh_decision_text_document_type`	Document type of linked text
`vfgh_decision_text_court`	Court of linked decision text
`vfgh_decision_text_decision_date`	Decision date of linked text
`vfgh_decision_text_document_url`	URL of linked decision text
`vfgh_decision_text_document_number`	Document number of linked text
`vfgh_decision_text_decision_type`	Decision type of linked text

BVwG (Federal Administrative Court)

Column	Description
`bvwg_decision_type`	Decision type
`bvwg_court`	Court name
`bvwg_note`	Editorial note

LVwG (State Administrative Courts)

Column	Description
`lvwg_decision_type`	Decision type
`lvwg_court`	Court name
`lvwg_indices`	Legal index entries (list-column)
`lvwg_federal_state`	Federal state
`lvwg_note`	Editorial note
`lvwg_legal_principle_numbers`	Legal principle numbers (list-column)

Justiz (Ordinary Courts: OGH, OLG, LG, BG)

Column	Description
`justiz_decision_type`	Decision type
`justiz_court`	Court name
`justiz_legal_areas`	Legal areas (list-column)
`justiz_specialist_areas`	Specialist areas (list-column)
`justiz_text_numbers`	Text numbers (list-column)
`justiz_legal_principle_numbers`	Legal principle numbers (list-column)
`justiz_citation`	Citation / reference
`justiz_note`	Editorial note
`justiz_decision_texts`	Linked decision texts (list-column)
`justiz_decision_text_case_number`	Case number of linked text
`justiz_decision_text_document_type`	Document type of linked text
`justiz_decision_text_court`	Court of linked text
`justiz_decision_text_decision_type`	Decision type of linked text
`justiz_decision_text_decision_date`	Decision date of linked text
`justiz_decision_text_note`	Note on linked text
`justiz_decision_text_document_url`	URL of linked text

DSK / DSB (Data Protection Authority)

Column	Description
`dsk_decision_type`	Decision type
`dsk_brief_info`	Brief information / summary
`dsk_deciding_authority`	Deciding authority
`dsk_appeal`	Appeal status
`dsk_country`	Country
`dsk_language`	Language
`dsk_access`	Access level
`dsk_decision_on_dsb_document`	Decision on DSB document
`dsk_note`	Editorial note
`dsk_legal_principle_numbers`	Legal principle numbers (list-column)

DOK (Disciplinary Bodies)

Column	Description
`dok_decision_type`	Decision type
`dok_brief_info`	Brief information / summary
`dok_deciding_authority`	Deciding authority

GBK (Equal Treatment Commission)

Column	Description
`gbk_decision_type`	Decision type
`gbk_commission`	Commission
`gbk_senate`	Senate
`gbk_discrimination_ground`	Discrimination ground
`gbk_discrimination_offense`	Discrimination offense type