Your existing web framework tooling can work seamlessly with the Serverless Framework. Let’s go over how to use the Python web framework Flask to deploy a Serverless REST API.
In this walk-through, we will:
- Deploy a simple API endpoint
- Add a DynamoDB table and two endpoints to create and retrieve a User object
- Set up path-specific routing for more granular metrics and monitoring
- Configure your environment for local development for a faster development experience.
If you already have a Flask application that you want to convert to Serverless, skip to the Converting an existing Flask application section below.
If you want to skip the walkthrough and just get started with a fully-configured template, check out the Using the Quick Start Template section below.
Getting Started
To get started, you'll need the Serverless Framework installed. You'll also need your environment configured with AWS credentials.
Creating and deploying a single endpoint
Let's start by deploying a single endpoint.
First, create a new directory with a package.json file:
$ mkdir my-flask-application && cd my-flask-application
$ npm init -fThen, install a few dependencies. We're going to use the serverless-wsgi plugin for negotiating the API Gateway event type into the WSGI format that Flask expects. We'll also use the serverless-python-requirements plugin for handling our Python packages on deployment.
$ npm install --save-dev serverless-wsgi serverless-python-requirementsIf you want a deeper dive on the
serverless-python-requirementsplugin, check out our previous post on handling Python packaging with Serverless.
With our libraries installed, let's write our Flask application. Create a file app.py with the following contents:
# app.py
from flask import Flask
app = Flask(__name__)
@app.route("/")
def hello():
return "Hello World!"This is a very simple application that returns "Hello World!" when a request comes in on the root path /. It's the example application shown on Flask's landing page with no modifications.
To get this application deployed, create a serverless.yml in the working directory:
# serverless.yml
service: serverless-flask
plugins:
- serverless-python-requirements
- serverless-wsgi
custom:
wsgi:
app: app.app
packRequirements: false
pythonRequirements:
dockerizePip: non-linux
provider:
name: aws
runtime: python3.6
stage: dev
region: us-east-1
functions:
app:
handler: wsgi.handler
events:
- http: ANY /
- http: 'ANY {proxy+}'Note: a previous version of this post set dockerizePip: true instead of dockerizePip: non-linux. You'll need serverless-python-requirements v3.0.5 or higher for this option.
This is a pretty basic configuration. We've created one function, app. The handler is handler function from the wsgi module. Note that this module will be added to our deployment package by the serverless-wsgi plugin. We configure our application's entry point in the custom block under the wsgi section. We declare that our app's entrypoint is app.app, which means the app object in the app.py module.
For our function's events configuration, we've used a very broad path matching so that all requests on this domain are routed to this function. All of the HTTP routing logic will be done inside the Flask application.
The last thing we need to do is handle our Python packages. The serverless-python-requirements plugin looks for a requirements.txt file in our working directory and installs them into our deployment package. Let's build that requirements.txt file.
First, create a virtual environment and activate it. I'm using Python3 in my serverless.yml, so I'm specifying that here as well:
$ virtualenv venv --python=python3
$ source venv/bin/activateIf you need a walkthrough on using Python virtual environments, check out Kenneth Reitz's walkthrough.
Then, install the Flask package with pip, and save your dependencies in requirements.txt:
(venv) $ pip install flask
(venv) $ pip freeze > requirements.txtNow, deploy your function:
$ sls deploy
... snip ...
Service Information
service: serverless-flask
stage: dev
region: us-east-1
stack: serverless-flask-dev
api keys:
None
endpoints:
ANY - https://bl4r0gjjv5.execute-api.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/dev
ANY - https://bl4r0gjjv5.execute-api.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/dev/{proxy+}
functions:
app: serverless-flask-dev-appAfter a minute, the console will show your endpoints in the Service Information section. Navigate to that route in your browser:
You did it—a real, live application on the Internet!
Adding a DynamoDB table with REST-like endpoints
Doing a "Hello World!" is fun, but your application will need to persist some sort of state to be useful. Let's add a DynamoDB table as our backing store.
For this simple example, let's say we're storing Users in a database. We want to store them by userId, which is a unique identifier for a particular user.
First, we'll need to configure our serverless.yml to provision the table. This involves three parts:
- Provisioning the table in the
resourcessection; - Adding the proper IAM permissions; and
- Passing the table name as an environment variable so our functions can use it.
Change your serverless.yml to look as follows:
# serverless.yml
service: serverless-flask
plugins:
- serverless-python-requirements
- serverless-wsgi
custom:
tableName: 'users-table-${self:provider.stage}'
wsgi:
app: app.app
packRequirements: false
pythonRequirements:
dockerizePip: non-linux
provider:
name: aws
runtime: python3.6
stage: dev
region: us-east-1
iamRoleStatements:
- Effect: Allow
Action:
- dynamodb:Query
- dynamodb:Scan
- dynamodb:GetItem
- dynamodb:PutItem
- dynamodb:UpdateItem
- dynamodb:DeleteItem
Resource:
- { "Fn::GetAtt": ["UsersDynamoDBTable", "Arn" ] }
environment:
USERS_TABLE: ${self:custom.tableName}
functions:
app:
handler: wsgi.handler
events:
- http: ANY /
- http: 'ANY {proxy+}'
resources:
Resources:
UsersDynamoDBTable:
Type: 'AWS::DynamoDB::Table'
Properties:
AttributeDefinitions:
-
AttributeName: userId
AttributeType: S
KeySchema:
-
AttributeName: userId
KeyType: HASH
ProvisionedThroughput:
ReadCapacityUnits: 1
WriteCapacityUnits: 1
TableName: ${self:custom.tableName}We provisioned the table in the resources section using CloudFormation syntax. We also added IAM permissions for our functions under the iamRoleStatements portion of the provider block. Finally, we passed the table name as the environment variable USERS_TABLE in the environment portion of the provider block.
Now, let's update our application to use the table. We'll implement two endpoints: POST /users to create a new user, and GET /users/{userId} to get information on a particular user.
Update your app.py as follows:
# app.py
import os
import boto3
from flask import Flask, jsonify, request
app = Flask(__name__)
USERS_TABLE = os.environ['USERS_TABLE']
client = boto3.client('dynamodb')
@app.route("/")
def hello():
return "Hello World!"
@app.route("/users/<string:user_id>")
def get_user(user_id):
resp = client.get_item(
TableName=USERS_TABLE,
Key={
'userId': { 'S': user_id }
}
)
item = resp.get('Item')
if not item:
return jsonify({'error': 'User does not exist'}), 404
return jsonify({
'userId': item.get('userId').get('S'),
'name': item.get('name').get('S')
})
@app.route("/users", methods=["POST"])
def create_user():
user_id = request.json.get('userId')
name = request.json.get('name')
if not user_id or not name:
return jsonify({'error': 'Please provide userId and name'}), 400
resp = client.put_item(
TableName=USERS_TABLE,
Item={
'userId': {'S': user_id },
'name': {'S': name }
}
)
return jsonify({
'userId': user_id,
'name': name
})In addition to base "Hello World" endpoint, we now have two new endpoints:
GET /users/:userIdfor getting a UserPOST /usersfor creating a new User
We've added a boto3 dependency, so let's install that into our virtual environment and update our requirements in requirements.txt:
$ pip install boto3
$ pip freeze > requirements.txtLet's deploy the service and test it out!
$ sls deployWe'll use curl for these examples. Set the BASE_DOMAIN variable to your unique domain and base path so it's easier to reuse:
export BASE_DOMAIN=https://bl4r0gjjv5.execute-api.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/devThen, let's create a user:
$ curl -H "Content-Type: application/json" -X POST ${BASE_DOMAIN}/users -d '{"userId": "alexdebrie1", "name": "Alex DeBrie"}'
{
"name": "Alex DeBrie",
"userId": "alexdebrie1"
}Nice—we've created a new user! Now, let's retrieve the user with the GET /users/:userId` endpoint:
$ curl -H "Content-Type: application/json" -X GET ${BASE_DOMAIN}/users/alexdebrie1
{
"name": "Alex DeBrie",
"userId": "alexdebrie1"
}This isn't a full-fledged REST API, and you'll want to add things like error handling, authentication, and additional business logic. This does give a framework in which you can work to set up those things.
Path-specific routing
Let's take another look at our function configuration in serverless.yml:
functions:
app:
handler: wsgi.handler
events:
- http: ANY /
- http: 'ANY {proxy+}'
We're forwarding all traffic on the domain to our application and letting Flask handle the entirety of the routing logic. There is a benefit to this—you don't have to manually string up all my routes and functions. You can also limit the impact of cold-starts on lightly-used routes.
However, we also lose some of the benefits of the serverless architecture. You can isolate your bits of logic into separate functions and get a decent look at your application from standard metrics.
If each route is handled by a different Lambda function, then you can see:
- How many times each route is invoked
- How many errors you have for each route
- How long each route takes (and how much money you could save if you made that route faster)
Luckily, you can still get these things if you want them! You can configure your serverless.yml so that different routes are routed to different instances of your function.
Each function instance will have the same code, but they'll be segmented for metrics purposes:
# serverless.yml
functions:
app:
handler: wsgi.handler
events:
- http: ANY /
- http: 'ANY {proxy+}'
getUser:
handler: wsgi.handler
events:
- http: 'GET /users/{proxy+}'
createUser:
handler: wsgi.handler
events:
- http: 'POST /users'Now, all requests to GET /users/:userId will be handled by the getUser instance of your application, and all requests to POST /users/ will be handled by the createUser instance. For any other requests, they'll be handled by the main app instance of your function.
Again, none of this is required, and it's a bit of an overweight solution; each specific endpoint will include the full application code for your other endpoints. However, it's a good balance between speed of development by using the tools you're used to, along with the per-endpoint granularity that serverless application patterns provide.
Local development configuration with Serverless offline plugin
When developing an application, it's nice to rapidly iterate by developing and testing locally rather than doing a full deploy between changes. In this section, we’ll cover how to configure your environment for local development.
The great thing about the serverless-wsgi plugin is that it includes a built-in solution for local development. To start the local server, just run sls wsgi serve:
$ sls wsgi serve
* Running on http://localhost:5000/ (Press CTRL+C to quit)
* Restarting with stat
* Debugger is active!
* Debugger PIN: 109-942-480Then navigate to your root page on localhost:5000 in your browser:
It works! If you make a change in your app.py file, it will be updated the next time you hit your endpoint. This rapidly improves development time.
While this works easily for a stateless endpoint like "Hello World!", it's a little trickier for our /users endpoints that interact with a database.
Luckily, there's a plugin for doing local development with a local DynamoDB emulator. We'll use the serverless-dynamodb-local plugin for this.
First, let's install the plugin:
$ npm install --save-dev serverless-dynamodb-local
Then, let's add the plugin to our serverless.yml. We'll also add some config in the custom block so that it locally creates our tables defined in the resources block:
# serverless.yml
plugins:
- serverless-python-requirements
- serverless-wsgi
- serverless-dynamodb-local
custom:
tableName: 'users-table-${self:provider.stage}'
wsgi:
app: app.app
packRequirements: false
pythonRequirements:
dockerizePip: non-linux
dynamodb:
start:
migrate: trueThen, run a command to install DynamoDB local:
$ sls dynamodb installFinally, we need to make some small changes to our application code. When instantiating our DynamoDB client, we'll add in some special configuration if we're in a local, offline environment.
When developing locally, the serverless-wsgi plugin sets an environment variable of IS_OFFLINE to true, so we'll use that to handle our config. Change the beginning of app.py to the following:
# app.py
import os
import boto3
from flask import Flask, jsonify, request
app = Flask(__name__)
USERS_TABLE = os.environ['USERS_TABLE']
IS_OFFLINE = os.environ.get('IS_OFFLINE')
if IS_OFFLINE:
client = boto3.client(
'dynamodb',
region_name='localhost',
endpoint_url='http://localhost:8000'
)
else:
client = boto3.client('dynamodb')
@app.route("/")
def hello():
return jsonify(os.environ)
... rest of application code ...Now, our DynamoDB client is configured to use DynamoDB local if we're running locally, or use the default options if running in Lambda.
Let's see it if works. You'll need two different terminal windows now. In your first window, start up DynamoDB local:
$ sls dynamodb start
Dynamodb Local Started, Visit: http://localhost:8000/shell
Serverless: DynamoDB - created table users-table-devIn the second window, start up your local WSGI server:
sls wsgi serve
* Running on http://localhost:5000/ (Press CTRL+C to quit)
* Restarting with stat
* Debugger is active!
* Debugger PIN: 109-942-480Let's run our curl command from earlier to hit our local endpoint and create a user:
$ curl -H "Content-Type: application/json" -X POST http://localhost:5000/users -d '{"userId": "alexdebrie1", "name": "Alex DeBrie"}'
{
"name": "Alex DeBrie",
"userId": "alexdebrie1"
}And then retrieve the user:
$ curl -H "Content-Type: application/json" -X GET http://localhost:5000/users/alexdebrie1
{
"name": "Alex DeBrie",
"userId": "alexdebrie1"
}Yep, it works just like it did on Lambda.
This local setup can really speed up your workflow while still allowing you to emulate a close approximation of the Lambda environment.
Converting an existing Flask application
If you already have an existing Flask application, it's very easy to convert to a Serverless-friendly application. Do the following steps:
-
Install the
serverless-wsgiandserverless-python-requirementspackages --npm install --save serverless-wsgi serverless-python-requirements -
Configure your
serverless.yml:You should have a
serverless.ymlthat looks like the following:# serverless.yml service: serverless-flask plugins: - serverless-python-requirements - serverless-wsgi custom: wsgi: app: app.app packRequirements: false pythonRequirements: dockerizePip: non-linux provider: name: aws runtime: python3.6 stage: dev region: us-east-1 functions: app: handler: wsgi.handler events: - http: ANY / - http: 'ANY {proxy+}'
Make sure that the value for app under the custom.wsgi block is configured for your application. It should be <module.instance>, where module is the name of the Python file with your Flask instance and instance is the name of the variable with your Flask application.
- Deploy your function with
sls deploy!
Note: if you use other resources (databases, credentials, etc.), you'll need to make sure those make it into your application. Check out our other material on managing secrets & API keys with Serverless.
Using the Quick Start Template
If you don't have an existing Flask application to convert, but you want a well-structured starting point for an application, you can check out our serverless-flask application template.
To use it, you'll need the Serverless Framework installed. You'll also need your environment configured with AWS credentials.
With the Framework installed, use the sls install command to clone the template project. Then, change into the directory and run a postsetup script to configure it as desired:
$ serverless install --url https://github.com/alexdebrie/serverless-flask --name my-flask-app
$ cd my-flask-app && npm run setupThen run sls deploy and hit the main web page to see your starter application:
You're off and running! What will you build? ⚡️
