Given the simplicity of Flask, it seemed like a good match for building APIs. The next thing to find was a "Django REST Framework" for Flask.

!!! check "Inspired **FastAPI** to"
    Be a micro-framework. Making it easy to mix and match the tools and parts needed.

    Have a simple and easy to use routing system.


### <a href="https://requests.readthedocs.io" class="external-link" target="_blank">Requests</a>

```

Whenever you need the client to pass information in the request and you don't know how to, you can search (Google) how to do it in `httpx`, or even how to do it with `requests`, as HTTPX's design is based on Requests' design.

Then you just do the same in your tests.

E.g.:

* To pass a *path* or *query* parameter, add it to the URL itself.

But FastAPI also supports using <a href="https://docs.python.org/3/library/dataclasses.html" class="external-link" target="_blank">`dataclasses`</a> the same way:

```Python hl_lines="1  7-12  19-20"
{!../../../docs_src/dataclasses/tutorial001.py!}
```

Up to here, everything would work as normally.

* Check if there's a <a href="https://github.com/tiangolo/fastapi/discussions/categories/translations" class="external-link" target="_blank">GitHub Discussion</a> to coordinate translations for your language. You can subscribe to it, and when there's a new pull request to review, an automatic comment will be added to the discussion.

            Greater than. If set, value must be greater than this. Only applicable to
            numbers.
            """
        ),
    ] = None,
    ge: Annotated[
        Optional[float],
        Doc(
            """
            Greater than or equal. If set, value must be greater than or equal to
            this. Only applicable to numbers.
            """
        ),
    ] = None,
    lt: Annotated[

# Middleware

You can add middleware to **FastAPI** applications.

A "middleware" is a function that works with every **request** before it is processed by any specific *path operation*. And also with every **response** before returning it.

* It takes each **request** that comes to your application.
* It can then do something to that **request** or run any needed code.

That's why in this example we have to declare it in the `response_model` parameter.

...but continue reading below to see how to overcome that.

## Return Type and Data Filtering

Let's continue from the previous example. We wanted to **annotate the function with one type** but return something that includes **more data**.

We want FastAPI to keep **filtering** the data using the response model.

And it shows their true commitment to FastAPI and its **community** (you), as they not only want to provide you a **good service** but also want to make sure you have a **good and healthy framework**, FastAPI. 🙇

There's a small detail about names to keep in mind. 💡

The word "**server**" is commonly used to refer to both the remote/cloud computer (the physical or virtual machine) and also the program that is running on that machine (e.g. Uvicorn).

Just keep in mind that when you read "server" in general, it could refer to one of those two things.