When you check the benchmarks, it is common to see several tools of different types compared as equivalent.

Specifically, to see Uvicorn, Starlette and FastAPI compared together (among many other tools).

The simpler the problem solved by the tool, the better performance it will get. And most of the benchmarks don't test the additional features provided by the tool.

The hierarchy is like:

* **Uvicorn**: an ASGI server

### What is "Mounting"

"Mounting" means adding a complete "independent" application in a specific path, that then takes care of handling all the sub-paths.

This is different from using an `APIRouter` as a mounted application is completely independent. The OpenAPI and docs from your main application won't include anything from the mounted application, etc.

# Testing

Thanks to <a href="https://www.starlette.io/testclient/" class="external-link" target="_blank">Starlette</a>, testing **FastAPI** applications is easy and enjoyable.

It is based on <a href="https://www.python-httpx.org" class="external-link" target="_blank">HTTPX</a>, which in turn is designed based on Requests, so it's very familiar and intuitive.

@needs_py310
def test_typing():
    types = {
        list[int]: [1, 2, 3],
        dict[str, list[int]]: {"a": [1, 2, 3], "b": [4, 5, 6]},
        set[int]: [1, 2, 3],  # `set` is converted to `list`
        tuple[int, ...]: [1, 2, 3],  # `tuple` is converted to `list`
    }
    for test_type, expect in types.items():
        app = FastAPI()

        @app.post("/", response_model=test_type)

# 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.

# Get Current User

In the previous chapter the security system (which is based on the dependency injection system) was giving the *path operation function* a `token` as a `str`:

=== "Python 3.9+"

    ```Python hl_lines="12"
    {!> ../../../docs_src/security/tutorial001_an_py39.py!}
    ```

=== "Python 3.8+"

    ```Python hl_lines="11"
    {!> ../../../docs_src/security/tutorial001_an.py!}
    ```

=== "Python 3.8+ non-Annotated"

        username: str = payload.get("sub")
        if username is None:
            raise credentials_exception
        token_data = TokenData(username=username)
    except JWTError:
        raise credentials_exception
    user = get_user(fake_users_db, username=token_data.username)
    if user is None:
        raise credentials_exception
    return user

        username: str = payload.get("sub")
        if username is None:
            raise credentials_exception
        token_data = TokenData(username=username)
    except JWTError:
        raise credentials_exception
    user = get_user(fake_users_db, username=token_data.username)
    if user is None:
        raise credentials_exception
    return user

                },
                {
                    "loc": ["query", "skip"],
                    "msg": "value is not a valid integer",
                    "type": "type_error.integer",
                },
                {
                    "loc": ["query", "limit"],
                    "msg": "value is not a valid integer",
                    "type": "type_error.integer",
                },
            ]
        }
    )

    class Config:
        orm_mode = True


class UserBase(BaseModel):
    email: str


class UserCreate(UserBase):
    password: str


class User(UserBase):
    id: int
    is_active: bool
    items: list[Item] = []

    class Config: