Obele

Obele is a lightweight SQLite ORM and key-value store for modern Python applications. It keeps a small, Django-like API for models and queries while supporting both synchronous code and native asyncio workflows.

Highlights

• Sync and async APIs for models, queries, raw SQL, search, and KV operations. Every method has an a-prefixed async twin that runs on a worker thread, so transactions and scoped bindings behave identically in both worlds.
• Thread-safe SQLite connection management: per-thread connections under WAL mode, transactions with savepoint nesting, scoped database bindings, and query logging. Plain ":memory:" databases are shared across threads.
• Declarative models with field validation, foreign keys, reverse relations, expressions (F("views") + 1), lazy slicing, prefetching, mixins, signals, pagination, and FTS5 search indexes.
• Persistent dict-like KVStore with namespaces, TTL, atomic operations, range/prefix/scan queries, memoization, serializers, and async methods.

Requirements

• Python 3.13 or newer.
• SQLite with FTS5 enabled for full-text search features.

Obele has no required runtime dependencies outside the Python standard library.

Installation

pip install obele

For local development:

git clone https://github.com/ichinga-samuel/obele.git
cd obele
python -m pip install -e ".[dev]"
pytest -q

Quickstart

import asyncio
from obele import Database, Model, TextField, IntegerField

Database.configure("app.sqlite3")

class User(Model):
    table_name = "users"
    name = TextField()
    age = IntegerField(nullable=True)

async def main():
    await User.acreate_table()

    await User.acreate(name="Alice", age=30)
    await User.acreate(name="Bob", age=25)

    users = await User.filter(age__gte=18).order_by("name").aall()
    for user in users:
        print(user.name, user.age)

    await Database.aclose_all()

asyncio.run(main())

The same API is available synchronously by omitting the a prefix:

User.create_table()
User.create(name="Ada", age=36)
adults = User.filter(age__gte=18).all()

Direct SQL

Use Database helpers when you need lower-level access:

cursor = Database.execute(
    "INSERT INTO users (name, age) VALUES (?, ?)",
    ["Grace", 40],
)
print(cursor.lastrowid)

row = Database.fetchone("SELECT name FROM users WHERE id = ?", [cursor.lastrowid])

Async helpers return fully materialized results - no cursors to manage:

result = await Database.aexecute(
    "INSERT INTO users (name, age) VALUES (?, ?)",
    ["Linus", 33],
)
print(result.lastrowid)

row = await Database.afetchone("SELECT name FROM users WHERE age > ?", [30])

Database.aexecute() and Database.aexecutemany() return an ExecResult containing rows, rowcount, and lastrowid; there is no async cursor to close. The former obele.asqlite and raw async-connection exports are no longer part of the public API.

Transactions And Scoped Databases

with Database.transaction(mode="IMMEDIATE"):
    User.create(name="One")
    User.create(name="Two")

async with Database.transaction():
    await User.acreate(name="Async One")
    await User.acreate(name="Async Two")

Transaction modes are DEFERRED, IMMEDIATE (the default), and EXCLUSIVE. Nested transactions use savepoints.

Use scoped bindings for tests, tenants, or short-lived alternate databases:

with Database.using("tenant.sqlite3"):
    User.create_table()
    User.create(name="Tenant User")

Key-Value Store

from obele import KVStore

settings = KVStore("settings", key_type=str, namespace="app")
settings["theme"] = "dark"
settings.set("session", {"user_id": 1}, ttl=3600)

print(settings["theme"])
print(settings.prefix("sess"))

Async KV methods are prefixed with a:

await settings.aset("feature:search", True)
enabled = await settings.aget("feature:search")

Security

Obele builds SQL with bound parameters and validates every identifier it interpolates (table, column, pragma, and annotation names), so ordinary queries are safe against injection. Two features deserve care:

• PickleField and the KVStore default "auto" serializer fall back to pickle, and reading those values deserializes them - which executes code. Point them only at databases you control. Use JSONField or KVStore(..., serializer="json") when the data may come from elsewhere.
• RawSQL and Database.execute() pass your SQL through verbatim. Bind user input as parameters rather than formatting it into the string.

Documentation

• User Guide
• Architecture and Execution Model
• Migration CLI
• API Reference
• Queries
• Fields
• Key-Value Store

To preview the docs locally:

mkdocs serve

Testing

The test suite is organized by public behavior and uses the local checkout by default via pyproject.toml.

pytest -q

Current suite coverage includes ORM CRUD, queries, async behavior, direct database access, FTS search, pagination, signals, field types, and KVStore features.

License

Obele is released under the MIT License. See LICENSE.