BaseAPI

Easily create maintainable API clients.

Rationale

Building other Python based API clients I found that there was a tendency to end up with a "mega-class", containing most of the definitions of my API. BaseAPI tries to keep unrelated API concepts separate, hopefully making for an easier maintenance experience.

Installation

PyPi is the easiest way to install:

pip install base-api

Usage

Creating a client

Normally the Client class is inherited to create your own client class:

from baseapi import Client


class MyClient(Client):
    DEFAULT_URL = 'https://my-api.com'

Here we've set our default API URL. This can also be set during the creation of the client:

client = MyClient(url='https://localhost')

Creating APIs

To populate your client with functions to access your API use individual API classes. These reflect an isolated part of your overall API.

As an example, you may have an authorization component to your API. To add authorization to your client library, you may create a file called auth.py:

from baseapi.apis import GraphqlApi


class AuthApi(GraphqlApi):
    def login(self, username, password):
        login_query = '...'
        data = {
            'username': username,
            'password': password
        }
        return self.perform_query(login_query, data)

    def logout(self):
        logout_query = '...'
        return self.perform_query(logout_query)

Once you have this slice of your API ready, you can add it to your client by specifying it during the client class definition:

from baseapi import Client


class MyClient(Client):
    DEFAULT_URL = 'https://my-api.com'
    DEFAULT_APIS = (
        'auth',
    )

In this case, auth.py must be placed in your PYTHONPATH, most likely alongside your client class file. Now, you may access the APIs methods on your client as such:

client = MyClient()
client.login('username', 'password')

There are currently two API types supported, GraphQL and Rest. The same auth API as above, but using Rest instead:

from baseapi.apis import RestApi


class AuthApi(RestApi):
    def login(self, username, password):
        data = {
            'username': username,
            'password': password
        }
        return self.post('/login', data)

    def logout(self):
        return self.post('/logout')

Exposing methods to the client

The methods in an API that get exposed to a client are chosen based on a leading underscore. Those without an underscore are automatically added to the client class, while those with an underscore are treated as private.

So, as an example, a local validation method could be added to an API as such:

from baseapi.apis import RestApi


class MyApi(RestApi):
    def get_something(self, type):
        self._validate_type(type)
        return self.get('/api/something, data={'type': type})

    def _validate_type(self, type):
        # Do validation.
        pass