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API Star A smart Web API framework, designed for Python 3.
Community: https://discuss.apistar.org/
Features
Why should you consider using API Star for your next Web API project?
- API documentation - Interactive API documentation, that's guaranteed to always be in sync with your codebase.
- Client libraries - JavaScript and Python client libraries, driven by the typesystems that API Star generates.
- Schema generation - Support for generating Swagger or RAML API typesystems.
- Expressive - Type annotated views, that make for expressive, testable code.
- Performance - Dynamic behaviour for determining how to run each view makes API Star incredibly efficient.
- Throughput - Support for asyncio to allow for building high-throughput non-blocking applications.
Table of Contents
- Quickstart
- HTTP
- Type System
- Building Websites
- Renderers & Parsers
- Authentication & Permissions
- Settings & Environment
- Testing
- Backends
- Components
- Performance
- Deployment
- Changelog
- Development
Quickstart
Install API Star:
$ pip3 install apistar
Create a new project:
$ apistar new .
app.py
tests.py
$ cat app.py
from apistar import Include, Route
from apistar.frameworks.wsgi import WSGIApp as App
from apistar.handlers import docs_urls, static_urls
def welcome(name=None):
if name is None:
return {'message': 'Welcome to API Star!'}
return {'message': 'Welcome to API Star, %s!' % name}
routes = [
Route('/', 'GET', welcome),
Include('/docs', docs_urls),
Include('/static', static_urls)
]
app = App(routes=routes)
if __name__ == '__main__':
app.main()
Run the application:
$ apistar run
Running at http://localhost:8080/
Run the tests:
$ apistar test
tests.py ..
===== 2 passed in 0.05 seconds =====
View the interactive API documentation:
$ open http://localhost:8080/docs/
Choosing a framework
API Star allows you to either use a standard threaded WSGI application, or an asyncio application.
WSGI
The benefit of choosing a standard WSGI application is that you'll get better ecosystem support. The SQLAlchemy and Django ORM backends are available, and you can use a large range of existing Python libraries.
To start a new wsgi
project use:
$ pip install apistar
$ apistar new .
The application import line in the code will look like this:
from apistar.frameworks.wsgi import WSGIApp as App
ASyncIO
The benefit of an asyncio application is the potential for higher throughput, as you can avoid making thread-blocking calls in favour of co-operative concurrency using async/await. However you'll need to make sure that you only use async components for any blocking operations, such as calls to the database, reading from disk, or making a network request.
To start a new asyncio
project use:
$ pip install apistar[asyncio]
$ apistar new . --framework asyncio
The application import line in the code will look like this:
from apistar.frameworks.asyncio import ASyncIOApp as App
You may now include either regular or async handler functions...
def welcome(name=None):
# A regular handler function that contains no asynchronous operations.
...
async def welcome(name=None):
# An async handler, that may use `async/await` syntax for performing asynchronous operations.
...
HTTP
Requests
API Star allows you to dynamically inject various information about the incoming request into your views using type annotation.
from apistar import http
def show_request(request: http.Request):
return {
'method': request.method,
'url': request.url,
'headers': dict(request.headers)
}
def show_query_params(query_params: http.QueryParams):
return {
'params': dict(query_params)
}
def show_user_agent(user_agent: http.Header):
return {
'user-agent': user_agent
}
Some of the components you might use most often:
Component | Description |
---|---|
http.Request |
The HTTP request. Includes .method , .url , and .headers attributes. |
http.Headers |
The request headers, returned as a dictionary-like object. |
http.Header |
Lookup a single request header, corresponding to the argument name. Returns a string or None . |
http.QueryParams |
The request query parameters, returned as a dictionary-like object. |
http.QueryParam |
Lookup a single query parameter, corresponding to the argument name. Returns a string or None . |
http.Body |
The request body. Returns a bytestring. |
http.RequestData |
The parsed request data. Data type will depend on the Content-Type of the request. |
Responses
By default API star expects view to return plain data, and will return
200 OK
responses.
def create_project():
return {'name': 'new project', 'id': 123}
You can instead set the status code or headers by returning a Response
.
def create_project():
data = {'name': 'new project', 'id': 123}
headers = {'Location': 'http://example.com/project/123/'}
return Response(data, status=201, headers=headers)
URL Routing
Use {curly_braces}
in your URL conf to include a URL path parameter.
def echo_username(username):
return {'message': f'Welcome, {username}!'}
app = App(routes=[
Route('/{username}/', 'GET', echo_username)
])
Use Include
to include a list of routes.
user_routes = [
Route('/', 'GET', list_users),
Route('/', 'POST', create_user),
Route('/{user_id}', 'PUT', edit_user),
Route('/{user_id}', 'DELETE', delete_user)
]
routes = [
Include('/users', user_routes),
...
]
app = App(routes=routes)
Use type annotation on the view method to include typed URL path parameters.
users = {0: 'penny', 1: 'benny', 2: 'jenny'}
def echo_username(user_id: int):
username = users[user_id]
return {'message': f'Welcome, {username}!'}
app = App(routes=[
Route('/{user_id}/', 'GET', echo_username)
])
Parameters which do not correspond to a URL path parameter will be treated as
query parameters for scalar types such as int
or str
, or part of the
request body for composite types of dict
and list
.
def echo_username(username):
if username is None:
return {'message': 'Welcome!'}
return {'message': f'Welcome, {username}!'}
app = App(routes=[
Route('/hello/', 'GET', echo_username)
])
Reversing URLS
Rather than build URLs by hand, it is possible to generate URLs based on the endpoint, using Router's reverse_url()
.
from apistar.interfaces import Router
def get_player_details(player_name):
score = get_score(player_name)
return {'name': player_name, 'score': score}
def get_all_players(router: Router):
players = get_players()
player_list = [
{
'name': player.name,
'url': router.reverse_url('get_player_details', {'player_name': player.name})
}
for player in players
]
return {'players': player_list}
app = App(routes=[
Route('/players/', 'GET', get_all_players),
Route('/players/{player_name}/', 'GET', get_player_details),
])
Command Routing
In addition to routing URLs, you can also route commands, to make additional functionality available directly to the command line client.
For example...
from apistar import Command
from apistar.frameworks.wsgi import WSGIApp as App
...
routes = [
...
]
commands = [
Command('create_user', create_user),
Command('delete_user', delete_user)
]
app = App(routes=routes, commands=commands)
Type System
API Star comes with a type system that allows you to express constraints on the expected inputs and outputs of your interface.
Hereβs a quick example of what the type system in API Star looks like:
from apistar import typesystem
class Rating(typesystem.Integer):
minimum = 1
maximum = 5
class ProductSize(typesystem.Enum):
enum = ['small', 'medium', 'large']
class Product(typesystem.Object):
properties = {
'name': typesystem.string(max_length=100), # Use lowercase functions for inline declarations.
'rating': Rating,
'in_stock': typesystem.Boolean,
'size': ProductSize,
}
Data Validation
The main benefit of expressing our data constraints in a type system is that we can then use those types as annotations on our handler functions.
def create_product(product: Product):
...
routes = [
Route('/create_product/', 'POST', create_product)
]
Serialization
In addition to using the typesystem types for input validation, you can also use them to serialize the return values of your handler functions.
import typing
def list_products() -> typing.List[Product]:
queryset = ... # Query returning products from a data store.
return [Product(record) for record in queryset]
API Reference
The following typesystem types are currently supported:
String
Validates string data. A subclass of str
.
default
- A default to be used if a field using this typesystem is missing from a parentObject
.max_length
- A maximum valid length for the data.min_length
- A minimum valid length for the data.pattern
- A string or compiled regex that the data must match.format
- An identifier indicating a complex datatype with a string representation. For example"date"
, to represent an ISO 8601 formatted date string.trim_whitespace
-True
if leading and trailing whitespace should be stripped from the data. Defaults toTrue
.description
- A description for online documentation
Number
Validates numeric data. A subclass of float
.
default
- A default to be used if a field using this typesystem is missing from a parentObject
.maximum
- A float representing the maximum valid value for the data.minimum
- A float representing the minimum valid value for the data.exclusive_maximum
-True
for an exclusive maximum limit. Defaults toFalse
.exclusive_minimum
-True
for an exclusive minimum limit. Defaults toFalse
.multiple_of
- A float that the data must be strictly divisible by, in order to be valid.description
- A description for online documentation
Integer
Validates integer data. A subclass of int
.
default
- A default to be used if a field using this typesystem is missing from a parentObject
.maximum
- An int representing the maximum valid value for the data.minimum
- An int representing the minimum valid value for the data.exclusive_maximum
-True
for an exclusive maximum limit. Defaults toFalse
.exclusive_minimum
-True
for an exclusive minimum limit. Defaults toFalse
.multiple_of
- An integer that the data must be strictly divisible by, in order to be valid.description
- A description for online documentation
Boolean
Validates boolean input. Returns either True
or False
.
default
- A default to be used if a field using this typesystem is missing from a parentObject
.description
- A description for online documentation
Enum
Validates string input, against a list of valid choices. A subclass of str
.
default
- A default to be used if a field using this typesystem is missing from a parentObject
.enum
- A list of valid string values for the data.description
- A description for online documentation
Object
Validates dictionary or object input. A subclass of dict
.
default
- A default to be used if a field using this typesystem is missing from a parentObject
.properties
- A dictionary mapping string key names to typesystem or type values.description
- A description for online documentation
Note that child properties are considered to be required if they do not have a default
value.
Array
Validates list or tuple input. A subclass of list
.
items
- A typesystem or type or a list of typesystems or types.additional_items
- Whether additional items past the end of the listed typesystem types are permitted.min_items
- The minimum number of items the array must contain.max_items
- The maximum number of items the array must contain.unique_items
- Whether repeated items are permitted in the array.description
- A description for online documentation
Generating API Schemas
API Star is designed to be able to map well onto API description formats, known as "API Schemas".
There is currently provisional support for writing Swagger, RAML, or CoreJSON typesystems. See #69 for more details on work still to be done here.
The default output format is the built-in CoreJSON support:
$ apistar schema
{"_type":"document", ...}
The OpenAPI (Swagger) and RAML codecs are optional, and require installation of additional packages:
Swagger
$ pip install openapi-codec
$ apistar schema --format openapi
{"swagger": "2.0", "info": ...}
RAML
$ pip install raml-codec
$ apistar schema --format raml
#%RAML 0.8
...
Building Websites
Although API Star is designed primarily with Web APIs in mind, it is a general purpose framework, and does also give you the tools you need to build regular websites.
Templates
API Star includes a templating component, that allows you to return templated responses, using Jinja2.
templates/index.html:
<html>
<body>
<h1>Hello, {{ username }}</h1>
</body>
</html>
app.py:
from apistar import Route, annotate
from apistar.interfaces import Templates
from apistar.frameworks.wsgi import WSGIApp as App
from apistar.renderers import HTMLRenderer
@annotate(renderers=[HTMLRenderer()])
def hello(username: str, templates: Templates):
index = templates.get_template('index.html')
return index.render(username=username)
routes = [
Route('/', 'GET', hello)
]
settings = {
'TEMPLATES': {
'ROOT_DIR': 'templates', # Include the 'templates/' directory.
'PACKAGE_DIRS': ['apistar'] # Include the built-in apistar templates.
}
}
app = App(routes=routes, settings=settings)
Returning a string response from a view will default to using the text/json
content type. This means you will need to override this so that your HTML views
use the text/html
content type in their responses. There are a couple of ways you
can do this, including:
- by annotating your handler function so that it uses the
HTMLRenderer
(as shown above) - by returning a
Response
, including an explicitContent-Type
header (see Renderers section for an example)
Static Files
For serving static files, API Star uses whitenoise.
First make sure to install the whitenoise
package.
$ pip install whitenoise
Next, you'll then need to include the serve_static
handler in your routes.
This function expects to take a single URL argument, named path
.
from apistar import Route
from apistar.handlers import serve_static
routes = [
# ...
Route('/static/{path}', 'GET', serve_static)
]
Finally, include the directory that you'd like to serve static files from in your settings, like so:
settings = {
'STATICS': {
'ROOT_DIR': 'statics', # Include the 'statics/' directory.
'PACKAGE_DIRS': ['apistar'] # Include the built-in apistar static files.
}
}
app = App(routes=routes, settings=settings)
HTTP Sessions
API Star supports persistent HTTP sessions. You can access the session
as a dictionary-like object. The session is made available by including
the http.Session
class as an annotation on a handler. For example:
from apistar import Response, http
def login(username: str, password: str, session: http.Session):
if authenticate(username, password):
session['username'] = username
return Response(status=302, headers={'location': '/'})
else:
...
def logout(session: http.Session):
if 'username' in session:
del session['username']
return Response(status=302, headers={'location': '/'})
def homepage(session: http.Session):
username = session.get('username')
...
The default implementation stores the session information in local memory, which isn't suitable for anything other than development and testing. For production you'll need to implement a session store that integrates with some kind of persistent storage.
from apistar import Component
from apistar.interfaces import SessionStore
from myproject import RedisSessionStore # A SessionStore implementation.
routes = [
...
]
components = [
Component(SessionStore, init=RedisSessionStore)
]
app = App(routes=routes, components=components)
Renderers & Parsers
Renderers and parsers are responsible for handling the translation of incoming or outgoing bytestreams.
For example, when returning a response we'll often simply return a native
Python datastructure such as a dict
or list
. A renderer class is then
responsible for generating the bytes that should be used for the response body.
Renderers
API Star defaults to returning JSON responses. You can alter this behaviour by configuring the renderers that should be supported.
Configuring the installed renderers
We can install one or more renderers by adding them to our settings.
The RENDERERS
setting should be a list. For example if most of our
handlers return HTML responses, we might use the following:
settings = {
'RENDERERS': [HTMLRenderer()]
}
Alternatively we can specify the renderers to use on a specific handler function.
from apistar import annotate
from apistar.renderers import JSONRenderer
from myproject.renderers import CSVRenderer
@annotate(renderers=[JSONRenderer(), CSVRenderer()])
def download_current_dataset():
# Return some data, formatted either as JSON or CSV,
# depending on the request Accept header.
...
How a renderer is determined
API Star uses HTTP content negotiation to determine which renderer should
be returned. The Accept
header is inspected, and one of the available
installed renderers is selected. If the Accept header doesn't match any of the
installed renderers then a 406 Not Acceptable
response will be returned.
You can disable the content negotiation by including an explicit content_type
argument when returning a Response
. For example...
content = template.render(...)
return http.Response(content, content_type='text/html')
Parsers
Parsers are responsible for taking the incoming request body, and returning
the data structure it represents, given the Content-Type
of the request.
By default API Star supports parsing JSON or form encoded requests.
Configuring the installed parsers
We can install one or more parsers by adding them to our settings.
The PARSERS
setting should be a list. For example if we want to disable
form parsing, and only support JSON requests, we can do the following:
settings = {
'PARSERS': [JSONParser()]
}
Alternatively we can specify the parsers to use on a specific handler function.
from apistar import annotate
from apistar.parsers import MultiPartParser
@annotate(parsers=[MultiPartParser()])
def file_upload():
# Handles a file upload, using a multipart encoded request.
...
Authentication & Permissions
Authentication is the mechanism of associating an incoming request with a set of identifying credentials, such as the user the request came from, or the token that it was signed with. Permissions are the processes of using those credentials to determine if the request should be permitted.
Authentication
The Auth
component provides information about the currently authenticated user.
from apistar.interfaces import Auth
def display_user(auth: Auth):
return {
'is_authenticated': auth.is_authenticated(),
'user': auth.get_display_name()
}
It provides the following interface:
.get_display_name()
- Returns a string that should be used when displaying a username, orNone
for unauthenticated requests..get_user_id()
- Returns a string that can be used to uniquely identify the user, orNone
for unauthenticated requests..is_authenticated()
- ReturnsTrue
for an authenticated request,False
otherwise..user
- A reference to any persistent user information..token
- A reference to any other authentication information associated with the incoming request.
In our example above we haven't yet configured any authentication policy,
so our auth
argument will always be set to an instance of Unauthenticated
.
Requests to our endpoint will currently return a response like this:
{
"is_authenticated": false,
"user": null
}
Creating an authentication class
In order to authenticate our incoming requests we need to create an authentication class.
An authentication class must implement the authenticate
method, and
should return a subclass of Auth
, or None
if the request was not authenticated.
The authenticate
method can accept any installed components in its signature.
import base64
from apistar import http
from apistar.authentication import Authenticated
class BasicAuthentication():
def authenticate(self, authorization: http.Header):
"""
Determine the user associated with a request, using HTTP Basic Authentication.
"""
if authorization is None:
return None
scheme, token = authorization.split()
if scheme.lower() != 'basic':
return None
username, password = base64.b64decode(token).decode('utf-8').split(':')
return Authenticated(username)
Note that the Authenticated
class provides a shortcut which you can use
instead of implementing a subclass of Auth
.
Configuring the authentication policy
We can install one or more authentication policies by adding them to our settings.
The AUTHENTICATION
setting should be a list. Each authentication policy will be
attempted in turn.
settings = {
'AUTHENTICATION': [BasicAuthentication()]
}
Alternatively we can specify authentication policies on a specific handler function.
from apistar import annotate
from apistar.interfaces import Auth
from myproject.authentication import BasicAuthentication
@annotate(authentication=[BasicAuthentication()])
def display_user(auth: Auth):
# There are no required permissions set on this handler, so all requests
# will be allowed.
# Requests that have successfully authenticated using basic authentication
# will include user credentials in `auth`.
...
Permissions
Typically you'll want to either permit or deny an incoming request, based on the authentication credentials provided.
API Star provides a single built-in IsAuthenticated
permission class, or you
can implement your own for more complex cases.
Creating a permissions class
A permissions class should implement a has_permission()
method,
and return either True
or False
depending on if the request should
be permitted or not.
For example, if our user model includes an is_admin
field, we might want
to allow certain operations only for those users.
class IsAdminUser():
def has_permission(self, auth: Auth):
if not auth.is_authenticated():
return False
return auth.user.is_admin
Configuring the permissions policy
Configuring permissions is very similar to configuring authentication, you can do so globally, using the settings...
settings = {
'AUTHENTICATION': [BasicAuthentication()],
'PERMISSIONS': [IsAuthenticted()]
}
Or configure permissions on a specific handler...
@annotate(
authentication=[BasicAuthentication()],
permissions=[IsAuthenticated()]
)
def display_user(auth: Auth):
# Only authenticated requests will be allowed to access this handler.
...
Settings & Environment
Application settings
Application settings are configured at the point of instantiating the app.
routes = [
# ...
]
settings = {
'TEMPLATES': {
'ROOT_DIR': 'templates',
'PACKAGE_DIRS': ['apistar']
}
}
app = App(routes=routes, settings=settings)
You can include the application settings in a view, by using the Settings
type annotation:
from apistar import Settings
def debug_settings(settings: Settings):
"""
Return a JSON response containing the application settings dictionary.
"""
return settings
More typically you'll want to include settings into the build
method of
custom components, so that you can control their initialization, based on the
application settings.
Environment
Typically you'll want to follow the "twelve-factor app" pattern and store configuration variables in the environment, rather than keeping them under source control.
API Star provides an Environment
class that allows you to load the environment,
and ensure that it is correctly configured.
from apistar import environment, typesystem
class Env(environment.Environment):
properties = {
'DEBUG': typesystem.boolean(default=False),
'DATABASE_URL': typesystem.string(default='sqlite://')
}
env = Env()
Once you have an Environment
instance, you can use it when creating
the application settings.
settings = {
'DATABASE': {
'URL': env['DATABASE_URL']
}
}
Testing
API Star includes the py.test
testing framework. You can run all tests in
a tests.py
module or a tests/
directory, by using the following command:
$ apistar test
The simplest way to test a view is to call it directly.
from app import hello_world
def test_hello_world():
assert hello_world() == {"hello": "world"}
There is also a test client, that allows you to make HTTP requests directly to
your application, using the requests
library.
from app import app
from apistar import TestClient
def test_hello_world():
client = TestClient(app)
response = client.get('/hello_world/')
assert response.status_code == 200
assert response.json() == {"hello": "world"}
Requests made using the test client may use either relative URLs, or absolute URLs. In either case, all requests will be directed at your application, rather than making external requests.
response = client.get('http://www.example.com/hello_world/')
Backends
SQLAlchemy
API Star has optional support for SQLAlchemy.
To use this you first need to install sqlalchemy
and your chosen database driver.
$ pip install sqlalchemy
$ pip install psycopg2
Settings
You then need to add the database config to your settings, and install the additional components and commands for SQLAlchemy:
URL
- The Database URL.METADATA
- The SQLAlchemyMetadata
instance, typically from thedeclarative_base
.
from sqlalchemy.ext.declarative import declarative_base
from sqlalchemy import Column, Integer, String
from apistar.frameworks.wsgi import WSGIApp as App
from apistar.backends import sqlalchemy_backend
Base = declarative_base()
class Customer(Base):
__tablename__ = "Customer"
id = Column(Integer, primary_key=True)
name = Column(String)
routes = [
# ...
]
# Configure database settings.
settings = {
"DATABASE": {
"URL": "postgresql://:@localhost/apistar",
"METADATA": Base.metadata
}
}
app = App(
routes=routes,
settings=settings,
commands=sqlalchemy_backend.commands, # Install custom commands.
components=sqlalchemy_backend.components # Install custom components.
)
A few common driver configurations are listed below.
Database | Driver | URL format |
---|---|---|
PostgreSQL | psycopg2 |
postgresql://<username>:<password>@localhost/example |
MySQL | pymysql |
mysql+pymysql://<username>:<password>@localhost/example |
SQLite | sqlite3 (Python built-in) |
sqlite:///example.db |
Creating the database tables
Before starting you app you will likely need to create the database tables declared in your MetaData which you can do with the following command:
$ apistar create_tables
Migrations If you wish to use alembic migrations with sql alchemy you can use the following package
https://github.com/colanconnon/apistar_alembic_migrations
Interacting with the database
To interact with the database, use the Session
component. This will automatically
handle commit/rollback behavior, depending on if the view returns normally, or
raises an exception:
from apistar.backends.sqlalchemy_backend import Session
def create_customer(session: Session, name: str):
customer = Customer(name=name)
session.add(customer)
session.flush() # Flush the changes to the database. This will populate the customer id.
return {'id': customer.id, 'name': customer.name}
def list_customers(session: Session):
queryset = session.query(Customer).all()
return [
{'id': customer.id, 'name': customer.name}
for customer in queryset
]
To instead access the basic database configuration information in a handler,
use the SQLAlchemy
component.
This has the following attributes:
engine
- The globalEngine
instance.metadata
- TheMetaData
object passed into the settings.Session
- A boundsessionmaker
factory.
Django ORM
API Star has optional support for Django ORM.
To use this you first need to install django
and your chosen database driver.
$ pip install django
$ pip install psycopg2
Settings
You then need to add the database config to your settings and the django migration commands:
from apistar.frameworks.wsgi import WSGIApp as App
from apistar.backends import django_orm
routes = [
# ...
]
# Configure database settings.
settings = {
'DATABASES': {
'default': {
'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.postgresql',
'NAME': '...',
'HOST': 'localhost',
'USER': '...',
'PASSWORD': ''
}
},
'INSTALLED_APPS': ['project',]
}
app = App(
routes=routes,
settings=settings,
commands=django_orm.commands, # Install custom commands.
components=django_orm.components # Install custom components.
)
Migrations
You also need to manually create the migrations
directory inside the project
directory.
Before starting you app you will likely need to make migrations and then migrate which you can do with the following commands:
$ apistar makemigrations
$ apistar migrate
Create a new model
To create a new Django model you will want to create a new models.py
file and declare it.
from django.db import models
class Customer(models.Model):
name = models.CharField(max_length=255)
Accessing the database
To interact with the database, use the Session
component. This will automatically
handle commit/rollback behavior, depending on if the view returns normally, or
raises an exception:
from apistar.backends.django_orm import Session
def create_customer(session: Session, name: str):
customer = session.Customer(name=name)
customer.save()
return {'id': customer.id, 'name': customer.name}
def list_customers(session: Session):
queryset = session.Customer.objects.all()
return [
{'id': customer.id, 'name': customer.name}
for customer in queryset
]
Components
You can create new components to inject into your views. For example:
import base64
class User(object):
"""
A component representing the user that the incoming request is associated with.
"""
def __init__(self, username):
self.username = username
def authenticate_user(authorization: http.Header):
"""
Determine the user associated with a request, using HTTP Basic Authentication.
"""
if authorization is None:
return None
scheme, token = authorization.split()
if scheme.lower() != 'basic':
return None
username, password = base64.b64decode(token).decode('utf-8').split(':')
return User(username)
Next, register your component with the application:
from apistar import Component
components = [
Component(User, init=authenticate_user)
]
app = App(
routes=routes,
components=components
)
You can then use your component in a view:
def say_hello(user: User):
return {'hello': user.username}
Component Reference
A complete listing of the available built-in components:
Component | Description |
---|---|
http.Method |
The HTTP method of the request, such as GET . |
http.Host |
The host component of the request URL, such as 'example.com' . |
http.Port |
The port number that the request is made to, such as 443. |
http.Scheme |
The scheme component of the request URL, such as 'https'. |
http.Path |
The path component of the request URL, such as /api/v1/my_view/ . |
http.QueryString |
The query component of the request URL, such as page=2 . |
http.URL |
The full URL of the request, such as https://example.com/api/v1/my_view/?page=2 . |
http.Body |
The body of the request, as a bytestring. |
http.QueryParams |
A multi-dict containing the request query parameters. |
http.QueryParam |
A single request query parameter, corresponding to the keyword argument name. Automatically used for data arguments. |
http.Headers |
A multi-dict containing the request headers parameters. |
http.Header |
A single request query parameter, corresponding to the keyword argument name. |
http.Request |
The full request instance. |
interfaces.App |
The current application. |
interfaces.Console |
The console interface. Supports the .echo(message) interface. |
interfaces.CommandLineClient |
The command line parsing component. Supports the .parse(args) interface. |
interfaces.Injector |
Makes the dependency injection available to handler. Supports the .run(func) interface. |
interfaces.Router |
The router for the application instance. Supports the reverse_url(name, **kwargs) interface. |
interfaces.Schema |
The CoreAPI schema used to represent the API. |
interfaces.StaticFiles |
The static files component. Supports the get_url(path) interface. |
interfaces.Templates |
The template environment. Supports the get_template(path) interface. |
types.KeywordArgs |
A dictionary containing all the matched URL path arguments, or parsed command line parameters. |
types.ParamName |
A string representing the keyword argument with which a component is being injected into the view. May be for components that vary depending on the parameter name used. |
types.PathWildcard |
A string. May be used for URL path components that should support full wildcard matches, allowing '/' characters. |
types.Settings |
A dictionary containing the application settings. |
types.WSGIEnviron |
A dictionary containing the raw WSGI environ of the incoming request. |
Performance
API Star dynamically determines exactly what does and does not need to run for any given view, based on the annotations it includes. This means that it can be incredibly efficient.
For a simple JSON serialization test case, the TechEmpower benchmarks rank API Star as achieving the highest throughput of any Python, JavaScript, Ruby, or Go framework.
We'll be working towards adding further test case types to the TechEmpower benchmarks in the coming weeks, and including results from both WSGIApp and ASyncIOApp deployment modes.
Its also important to recognize that raw latency or throughput numbers are typically not the most important factor to take into consideration when choosing a framework. Having said that, one aim for API Star is to hit the sweet spot for both performance and for productivity.
Deployment
The Development Server
A development server is available, using the run
command:
$ apistar run
# Specify the port or interface via --port and --host
# Serve on port 9001 and use IPv6 only
$ apistar run --port 9001 --host ::1
# If you don't like the Werkzeug web debugger, turn it off
$ apistar run --no-debugger
Running in Production
Running a WSGIApp project
For WSGI applications, the recommended production deployment is Gunicorn, using the Meinheld worker.
$ pip install gunicorn
$ pip install meinheld
$ gunicorn app:app --workers=4 --bind=0.0.0.0:5000 --pid=pid --worker-class=meinheld.gmeinheld.MeinheldWorker
Typically you'll want to run as many workers as you have CPU cores on the server.
Running an ASyncIOApp project
For asyncio applications, use uvicorn
.
$ uvicorn app:app --workers=4 --bind=0.0.0.0:5000 --pid=pid
Again, you'll typically want to run as many workers as you have CPU cores on the server.
"Serverless" deployments
API Star can also be deployed on so called "serverless" platforms. A good option for using API Star with this style of deployment is Zappa, which allows you to deploy any Python WSGI server onto AWS Lambda.
Note that only WSGIApp is supported using Zappa. You cannot run an ASyncIOApp under this deployment, as a standard WSGI interface is expected.
For Zappa to execute it needs to be provided with the path to your app
instance in its app_function
key. Given that your app
is contained within app.py
, e.g.
# app.py
app = App(routes=routes, settings=settings)
Your zappa_settings.json
configuration file should then look something like this:
{
"dev": {
"app_function": "app.app",
"aws_region": "us-east-1",
"profile_name": "default",
"s3_bucket": "<a-unique-s3-bucket-name>",
"keep_warm": false
},
"prod": {
"app_function": "app.app",
"aws_region": "us-east-1",
"profile_name": "default",
"s3_bucket": "<a-unique-s3-bucket-name>",
"debug": false,
"log_level": "WARNING",
"apigateway_description": "Description of your app on AWS API Gateway",
"lambda_description": "Description of your app on AWS Lambda",
}
}
See Zappa's installation instructions for full configuration details.
Notes
keep_warm
is a four minute callback to AWS to ensure your function stays loaded in AWS, decreasing the initial response time. When doing development work you don't really need the function to stay 'warm' 24/7 so by setting it tofalse
indev
it will save you some AWS invocation requests. The free tier at AWS gives you 1,000,000 free requests so it shouldn't matter too much.profile_name
specifies which alias to use in your AWS Credentials file. This is usually located at~/.aws/credentials
.
[default]
aws_access_key_id = 'xxx'
aws_secret_access_key = 'xxx'
To successfully run zappa deploy
you will need an IAM user on your AWS account with the a sufficiently permissive policy attached. See the discussions on Zappa's minimum policy requirements for more details.
Changelog
0.3 Release
- Added Authentication & Permissions support.
- Added Parsers & Renderers support, with content negotiation.
- Added HTTP Session support.
- Added
BEFORE_REQUEST
/AFTER_REQUEST
settings. - Added
SCHEMA
settings. - Added support for using
Injector
component inside a handler.
Note: Because we now support configurable renderers, there's a difference in
the behaviour of returning plain data, or a Response without a content_type
set.
Previously we would return HTML for strings/bytes, and JSON for anything else.
Now, JSON is the default for everything, unless alternative renderers are
specified. See the "Renderers & Parsers" and "Requests & Responses" section
for more detail.
0.2 Release
- Added
asyncio
support. - Added
app.main()
. - Added
Session
support for both SQLAlchemy and DjangoORM backends. - Added proper support for registering commands, and using components in command handler functions.
- Added proper support for registering new components, and separating component interfaces from component implementations.
- Introduced
from apistar.frameworks.wsgi import WSGIApp as App
instead offrom apistar import App
. - Introduced
from apistar.frameworks.asyncio import ASyncIOApp as App
instead offrom apistar import App
. - Changed
apistar new --layout [minimal|standard]
toapistar new --framework [wsgi|asyncio]
. - The TestClient() class now explicitly requires the app instance to be passed as an argument.
- Dropped overloaded typesystem classes. Use eg.
typesystem.String
for declarations andtypesystem.string()
for inlines. - Dropped single-lookup component
Template
. Just useTemplates
instead. - Dropped single-lookup component
Setting
. Just useSettings
instead. - Dropped unneccessary
ResponseData
annotation. - Dropped
WSGIResponse
. Either return data or aResponse
. - Dropped
build()
method on components. See the docs for information on creating and registering components. - Rationalized the 'TEMPLATES' and 'STATICS' settings.
Development
To work on the API Star codebase, you'll want to clone the repository, and create a Python virtualenv with the project requirements installed:
$ git clone git@github.com:tomchristie/apistar.git
$ cd apistar
$ ./scripts/setup
To run the continuous integration tests and code linting:
$ ./scripts/test
$ ./scripts/lint
API Star is BSD licensed code.
Designed & built in Brighton, England.
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