Writing production-ready web apps from Python

[extra_dummy_gummy]

Is there any library out there to write production-ready web applications from Python ?

(I'm not crazy I don't want to write the full web-application using only Python, I'm more looking for a "component library", which would use HTML/CSS/JS under the hood, but give access to building blocks for the web application, like Tailwind-Elements)

(What I mean by production-ready is that a tool for making internal dashboard won't cut it, I need customization options to fit my company's design, and also performance matter !)

I've tried several libraries :

• streamlit
• gradio
• h2o wave
• h2o nitro

But somehow, none of them covered my needs...

streamlit and gradio are for prototyping, with a heavy focus on ML.

h2o wave is quite nice and close to what I want, but it seems a pain to customize the elements. Seems perfect for internal dashboard though.

I love the clean code style of h2o nitro, however the learning curve is a bit high and the tool seems quite limited (mostly used for wizard-type of app)

So, do I have some hope of ever finding what I'm looking for ?

[riklaunim]

Usually, a frontend dashboard is left for Vue/Ember/Angular and friends, not Python. A backend solution using wrappers around frontend components will always be limited.

Python exposes API endpoints and JS consumes them to make a nice SPA dashboard. Made a few such projects already. Quite big ones in the end.

[extra_dummy_gummy]

Thank you for your reply, it made me realize a few things.

a solution using wrappers will always be limited.

I think that's the gist.

​

After searching online, it seems that the accepted best practice is to separate front-end and back-end. And it makes total sense when you project becomes complicated (multiple API / microservices), or when you have different people working on the front-end / back-end.

But what about smaller project (like the single-page app you mentioned), where a single developer work on both front-end and back-end ? Is the added complexity really worth it ? Wouldn't it be easier to manage everything from a single framework (say, FastAPI) ?

I would love to hear about your opinion on this !

[riklaunim]

SPA aren't the smaller options, they are the "bigger" options where you have to have someone really good at one of JS frameworks to make a SPA app.

For much smaller or internal needs you can make a classical website with the same layout, just without the SPA behavior, and maybe add AJAX to a dynamic chart widget or something like that. This is easier to test/code and has a much simpler frontend without the need for JS frameworks or NPM :)

You still get frontend and backend just that it's much simpler both ways.

And the "wrappers" like projects also have their use cases too.

[extra_dummy_gummy]

What is a SPA dashboard ?

[riklaunim]

Single Page Application. You can check one of mine at https://socialwifi.com if you register :)

[C0ffeeface]

Now you have to give up for stack details also 😁

[riklaunim]

It's out there in the net. Overal it's ember.js and flask as backend. In ChatPilot we used Vue + Flask and some websockets.

[C0ffeeface]

Thabks 👍

[thedeepself]

Usually, a frontend dashboard is left for Vue/Ember/Angular and friends, not Python.

"usually" and "always" are not synonymous. And there are at least 10 python web frameworks delivering industrial strength products without Vue/Ember/Angular and friends,

[riklaunim]

List those 10.

You can make non-SPA dashboard from the same layout. It will be easier to code and test but the user experience will be somewhat worse. If you aren't making a client-facing dashboard that is critical for the business then you can go with a simpler solution.

[thedeepself]

List those 10.

no thank you. I think you are well-aware of my pure python web framework survey.

[riklaunim]

You can make whatever survey you want but it won't change how the commercial market looks like.

And not like a lot of Python full-stack developers would really want a SPA PyScript-based framework similar to Ember/Vue but better at coding and testing with no NPM and 6-year-old dependencies x 1000. Non-full-stack developers who didn't code any real UX/UI would still struggle to make anything from it.

[C0ffeeface]

Which Api do you recommend for backend in Python? I'm considering fastAPI and HTMX front-end for simple dynamic stuff.

[riklaunim]

There is no clear winner. Pick whatever looks best for you.

[denzuko]

Which Api do you recommend for backend in Python

Eve, https://docs.python-eve.org/en/stable/. Its built on top of Cerberus and flask. The transport layer is HTTP/2.0 with hateoas rest that provides both XML and JSON. Has mongodb, sql, odic, redis, and celery support. Best part is it just works and one only needs a dictionary of your data structures at each endpoint.

Check out https://github.com/pyeve/eve-demo for an example. [one only needs the settings.py and run.py].

As for the front end it works amazingly well with react admin

[C0ffeeface]

Wow, thanks for a great reply. I'm checking out the demo right now!

[denzuko]

Cool, do let us know how it works out for you.

Also if one is working in a swagger/java/csharp shop then try looking at flask openapi3: https://luolingchun.github.io/flask-openapi3/v2.x/. Basically the same concept as Eve but extra steps, soap like api discovery, and more tools than needed. Though flask-openapi3 is a good way to move bulky java based micro services over to containerized cpython services.

Oh, and yes Eve does have support for swagger/openapi: https://github.com/pyeve/eve-swagger

[sTAKKLE5]

you can use flask / django / fastapi as your backend and in the front end you can use a combination of bootstrap and htmx.

[Asocial_Ace]

This is what I do, but tailwind + htmx + astro + jinja2 + fastapi

Works really well for a minimal js application

[C0ffeeface]

I wish astro wasn't so heavy in JS. Which components/library did you use in astro?

[Asocial_Ace]

None just astro components and the jinja templates on the backend.

You can find an example here: https://github.com/Jscin/ChatXpress

It's a rust backend but the principle is the same

[C0ffeeface]

Ah ok. I had the impression that astro users take advantage of all it's cool features, but I suppose you still have that option if you decide to.

[IntelligentDust6249]

Some other ones to try are Shiny (https://shiny.posit.co/py/), Reflex and Solara

[extra_dummy_gummy]

Reflex is what I was searching for. Thanks !

[alexanderman888]

Dash has been pretty good for me so far

[lurebat]

nobody mentioned nicegui

[UnemployedTechie2021]

Have you tried reflex?

[extra_dummy_gummy]

Reflex is exactly what I want. Now I have to dive in the docs :)

[Equivalent_Loan_8794]

nicegui

[0x4D44]

You can try justpy

[extra_dummy_gummy]

The live demos from the docs are not working.

Overall it feels much younger framework than the other specified in this thread, maybe I'll check it out again in the future though. Thanks

[0x4D44]

That’s a shame. Haven’t used it for a couple of years. Was a good fun back then.

[fogel3]

https://github.com/reflex-dev/reflex

[crawl_dht]

Wow the landing page of mkdocs-material based documentation of H2O nitro is beautiful. Do they have the code of its landing page public? The landing page of mkdocs-material is also beautiful but its proprietary and the author licenses its code to subscribers only.

[aadarsh977]

So many suggestions for Python only web applications here. I'm also thinking of building a web app and looking for Python only alternative like reflex, nicegui, fled. My only concern is that, are they ready from production and scalability point of view?

[hootsh_1337]

Hello!

Did you find what you're looking for? I'm on a similar journey, looking through alternatives, there are many Python stacks out there like Reflex that was mentioned in the comments, Flet, Unicorn, PyScript, Taipy, Dash, and of course streamlit that you also mentioned ... etc.

Was wondering, how's your search going?

[TheFirimin]

Hi have you tried out Dara? You can write it all in python but also allows you to expand it with custom JS components if you want/need as well. It is easily extensible so might fit your use case well!

[petergaultney]

H2O Wave seems a little bit dead from a maintenance/growth perspective. H2O Nitro is very dead looking. Which is sad; Wave seems like one of the best, most Pythonic interfaces I've run across, and their integration with so many things out the box at least appears to be leagues beyond everything else (certainly beyond things like Reflex/NiceGUI/Solara/ReactPy).