It gives you all the flexibility to choose the ones that fit your project the best.

And you can use directly many well maintained and widely used packages like `passlib` and `python-jose`, because **FastAPI** doesn't require any complex mechanisms to integrate external packages.

But it provides you the tools to simplify the process as much as possible without compromising flexibility, robustness, or security.

**FastAPI** doesn't require you to use a SQL (relational) database.

But you can use any relational database that you want.

Here we'll see an example using <a href="https://www.sqlalchemy.org/" class="external-link" target="_blank">SQLAlchemy</a>.

    * You can also add [`Security` dependencies with `scopes`](../advanced/security/oauth2-scopes.md){.internal-link target=_blank}.

!!! tip
    Having `dependencies` in the `APIRouter` can be used, for example, to require authentication for a whole group of *path operations*. Even if the dependencies are not added individually to each one of them.

!!! check

It has a `GET` operation that could return an error.

It has a `POST` operation that could return several errors.

Both *path operations* require an `X-Token` header.

=== "Python 3.10+"

    ```Python
    {!> ../../../docs_src/app_testing/app_b_an_py310/main.py!}
    ```

=== "Python 3.9+"

    ```Python

    {!> ../../../docs_src/settings/app02/main.py!}
    ```

!!! tip
    We'll discuss the `@lru_cache` in a bit.

    For now you can assume `get_settings()` is a normal function.

And then we can require it from the *path operation function* as a dependency and use it anywhere we need it.

=== "Python 3.9+"

    ```Python hl_lines="17  19-21"
    {!> ../../../docs_src/settings/app02_an_py39/main.py!}
    ```

functions with `Annotated` would **not be affected** at all.

If you call those functions in **other places in your code**, the actual **default values** will be kept, your editor will help you notice missing **required arguments**, Python will require you to pass required arguments at **runtime**, you will be able to **use the same functions** for different things and with different libraries (e.g. **Typer** will soon support `Annotated` too, then you could use the same function for an API...

                    "type": "missing",
                    "loc": ["body", "file"],
                    "msg": "Field required",
                    "input": None,
                },
                {
                    "type": "missing",
                    "loc": ["body", "fileb"],
                    "msg": "Field required",
                    "input": None,
                },
                {
                    "type": "missing",

                    "type": "missing",
                    "loc": ["body", "item"],
                    "msg": "Field required",
                    "input": None,
                },
                {
                    "type": "missing",
                    "loc": ["body", "user"],
                    "msg": "Field required",
                    "input": None,
                },
                {
                    "type": "missing",

                    "type": "missing",
                    "loc": ["body", "item"],
                    "msg": "Field required",
                    "input": None,
                },
                {
                    "type": "missing",
                    "loc": ["body", "user"],
                    "msg": "Field required",
                    "input": None,
                },
                {
                    "type": "missing",

                    "type": "missing",
                    "loc": ["body", "item"],
                    "msg": "Field required",
                    "input": None,
                },
                {
                    "type": "missing",
                    "loc": ["body", "user"],
                    "msg": "Field required",
                    "input": None,
                },
                {
                    "type": "missing",