proper 0.9.0

A python web framework for people who read their code

Proper Web Framework

Proper is a new Python web framework. Not another Flask clone, it's a Ruby-on-Rails clone :P.

More seriously: it isn't a clone, but it is heavily influenced by Rails in the ways that matter. Very opinionated, generator-heavy, focused on REST and server-rendered HTML, built around a fixed project structure, and packed with hardcoded batteries. You can swap pieces if you must, but the assumption is that you won't.

The one thing Proper does very differently: sync above, async below. The runtime is ASGI (you need it for performance and WebSockets), but the code you write is synchronous. No async/await confetti scattered across code that doesn't need concurrency.

Quick start

Requires uv.

uvx proper_new myapp
cd myapp
proper g resource Post title:str body:text
proper server

That's a working CRUD app with model, controller, views, routes, migrations, and tests.

Full (human-shaped) docs at properproject.org/docs.

Why not X?

Why not Flask? - Absolute freedom means absolute chaos.

Why not Django? - Django gives you the pieces and expects you to assemble them; Proper assembles them and gives you direction.

Why not FastAPI? - FastAPI is awesome, but has the opposite shape: It's all about APIs and async-first, while Proper is server-rendered and sync-first. Building a React SPA on top of a JSON backend? You might want to use it. Building HTML for humans? Try Proper.

Why Peewee instead of SQLAlchemy? - Smaller surface area, more readable, and ActiveRecord-style scopes fit it cleanly. SQLAlchemy is excellent but not something I want to read every day.

Why Jx instead of Jinja? - Server-rendered Python components with typed props and slots. See the Jx docs for the case.

Built with AI agents in mind

Proper ships with an official skill: properproject.org/skill.zip. Drop it in ~/.claude/skills/ and your agent will scaffold and edit your app the Proper way (pun intended).

This isn't just an extra. Hard conventions are exactly what makes AI output legible to humans: fewer tokens to understand a project, fewer surprises in generated code, and less effort reviewing it.

What's in the box

• Peewee ORM with migrations, query helpers, and connection handling
• Forms — declarative, validated, ORM-integrated, with rendering helpers
• Jx components — server-rendered Python components, typed props, slots
• Caching — fragment, action, and low-level, on SQLite or Redis
• Background tasks via Huey, with retries, schedules, and cron syntax
• Authentication — sessions, password resets, rate limiting, pwned-password checks
• File storage — disk and S3 adapters, signed URLs, image variants
• i18n — locale-aware routing, translations, pluralization, date formats
• Email — templated transactional mail, SMTP and console mailers
• WebSockets — channels, broadcasts, presence

For the press release

Proper is the Python web framework I built for myself after fifteen years in the trade, once I understood that hard conventions do not lock you in — they free you to focus on what's important.

(It also works for the back cover of my future biography by Walter Isaacson).

Status

This is 0.9, I'll call it 1.0 when I've found more bugs. Bug reports and contributions are very welcome. File them at github.com/jpsca/proper/issues.

Community

• Discord

License

Code: MIT. Documentation: CC BY-SA 4.0.

Made by Juan-Pablo Scaletti in Lima, Perú.