Rango API Framework

A modern Python web framework built on Starlette with Django-like features for rapid API development.

Features

• Starlette Integration: Built on top of Starlette for high performance and ASGI compatibility
• Django-like Structure: Familiar project and app structure similar to Django
• ORM Integration: Built-in Tortoise ORM support with Aerich migrations
• Generic Views: Pre-built views for common CRUD operations
• Serializers: Django REST Framework-like serializers
• CLI Tools: Command-line interface for project management
• CORS Middleware: Built-in CORS support
• Manual Database Management: Safe, Django-like database migration workflow

Installation

Option 1: Install globally (recommended for CLI usage)

pip install rango-api

Option 2: Use manage.py (for project-specific usage)

# Clone or download the framework
# Use python manage.py commands instead of rango commands

Quick Start

Option A: Using global CLI (if installed globally)

# 1. Create a new project
rango startproject myproject
cd myproject

# 2. Create an app
rango startapp blog

# 3. Initialize database
rango initdb

# 4. Start server
rango runserver

Option B: Using manage.py (project-specific)

# 1. Create a new project
python manage.py startproject myproject
cd myproject

# 2. Create an app
python manage.py startapp blog

# 3. Initialize database
python manage.py initdb

# 4. Start server
python manage.py runserver

Database Management

Rango Framework uses Tortoise ORM with Aerich for database migrations, providing a Django-like experience.

Initial Setup (First Time Only)

# After creating a project and app
python manage.py initdb

Development Workflow

# 1. Modify models in your app
# ... edit models.py ...

# 2. Create migrations
python manage.py makemigrations "description of changes"

# 3. Apply migrations
python manage.py migrate

# 4. Check status (optional)
python manage.py migrate_status

Production Safety

• No automatic migrations: Database schema changes must be explicitly applied
• Manual migration control: You control when and how migrations are applied
• Automatic DB connection: Database connection is initialized on first request
• Migration tracking: Aerich tracks applied migrations
• Rollback support: Aerich supports migration rollbacks

For detailed database management guide, see DATABASE_GUIDE.md.

Tutorial

Create models with ForeignKey

from tortoise import fields, models

class Category(models.Model):
    id = fields.IntField(pk=True)
    name = fields.CharField(max_length=100)

class Product(models.Model):
    id = fields.IntField(pk=True)
    title = fields.CharField(max_length=255)
    category = fields.ForeignKeyField('models.Category', related_name='products')

Serializers (nested FK supported)

from rango_api.serializers import ModelSerializer
from .models import Category, Product

class CategorySerializer(ModelSerializer):
    class Meta:
        model = Category
        fields = ["id", "name"]

class ProductSerializer(ModelSerializer):
    class Meta:
        model = Product
        fields = ["id", "title", "category"]  # can send category or category_id
        nested_serializers = {
            'Category': CategorySerializer
        }

Views (generic, with FK optimization)

from rango_api.generics import ListCreateView, RetrieveUpdateDeleteView
from .models import Product
from .serializers import ProductSerializer

class ProductListCreateView(ListCreateView):
    model = Product
    serializer_class = ProductSerializer
    select_related = ['category']  # optimize FK

class ProductDetailView(RetrieveUpdateDeleteView):
    model = Product
    serializer_class = ProductSerializer
    select_related = ['category']

URLs

from rango_api.router import Router
from .views import ProductListCreateView, ProductDetailView

router = Router()
router.add("/products", ProductListCreateView, methods=["GET", "POST"])
router.add("/products/{id}", ProductDetailView, methods=["GET", "PUT", "PATCH", "DELETE"])

Test the API

• Create category:

curl -X POST http://127.0.0.1:8000/categories \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"name":"Electronics"}'

• Create product (supports category or category_id):

curl -X POST http://127.0.0.1:8000/products \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"title":"Phone","category":1}'

Extensibility (DRF-like Hooks)

You can override hooks in generic views to customize behavior:

class ProductListCreateView(ListCreateView):
    model = Product
    serializer_class = ProductSerializer

    def get_queryset(self, request):
        return self.model.all().select_related('category')

    async def before_create(self, request, data: dict) -> dict:
        # mutate/validate incoming data
        data.setdefault("title", data.get("title", "Untitled"))
        return data

    async def after_create(self, request, obj):
        # side-effects, logging, etc.
        return obj

class ProductDetailView(RetrieveUpdateDeleteView):
    model = Product
    serializer_class = ProductSerializer

    async def before_update(self, request, obj, data: dict) -> dict:
        # e.g. normalize FK input
        if 'category' in data and 'category_id' not in data:
            data['category_id'] = data.pop('category')
        return data

Available hooks include: get_queryset, filter_queryset, before_create, perform_create, after_create, before_update, perform_update, after_update, before_delete, perform_delete, after_delete.

Project Structure

myproject/
├── apps/
│   └── blog/
│       ├── models.py
│       ├── serializers.py
│       ├── views.py
│       └── urls.py
├── project/
│   ├── settings.py
│   ├── urls.py
│   ├── views.py
│   └── asgi.py
├── main.py
└── manage.py

Basic Usage

Models

from tortoise import fields, models

class Post(models.Model):
    title = fields.CharField(max_length=255)
    content = fields.TextField()
    created_at = fields.DatetimeField(auto_now_add=True)

Serializers

from rango_api.serializers import ModelSerializer
from .models import Post

class PostSerializer(ModelSerializer):
    class Meta:
        model = Post
        fields = ["id", "title", "content", "created_at"]

Views

from rango_api.generics import ListCreateView, RetrieveUpdateDeleteView
from .models import Post
from .serializers import PostSerializer

class PostListCreateView(ListCreateView):
    model = Post
    serializer_class = PostSerializer

class PostDetailView(RetrieveUpdateDeleteView):
    model = Post
    serializer_class = PostSerializer

URLs

from rango_api.router import Router
from .views import PostListCreateView, PostDetailView

router = Router()
router.add("/posts", PostListCreateView, methods=["GET", "POST"])
router.add("/posts/{id}", PostDetailView, methods=["GET", "PUT", "DELETE"])

CLI Commands

Project Management

• python manage.py startproject <name> - Create a new project
• python manage.py startapp <name> - Create a new app
• python manage.py runserver [host] [port] - Start development server

Database Management

• python manage.py initdb - Initialize database and Aerich config (first time only)
• python manage.py makemigrations [message] - Create database migrations
• python manage.py migrate - Apply database migrations
• python manage.py migrate_status - Show migration status

Alternative CLI (if installed globally)

• rango startproject <name> - Create a new project
• rango startapp <name> - Create a new app
• rango initdb - Initialize database
• rango makemigrations [message] - Create migrations
• rango migrate - Apply migrations
• rango migrate_status - Show migration status
• rango runserver [host] [port] - Start development server

Requirements

• Python 3.8+
• Starlette
• Tortoise ORM
• Aerich (for migrations)
• Uvicorn

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

Support

If you have any questions or need help, please open an issue on GitHub.