Flask Starter

This is meant to be a quick jumping point for starting new Flask projects. You should be able to fork the repo, make a few changes and be ready for deployment to Heroku within a few minutes.

Specifics

• Python 3.6.x
• Flask 0.12
• MongoDB 3.x

Extensions Used

• Flask-Login
• Flask-MongoEngine
• Flask-WTF
• Flask-DebugToolbar (Dev only)
• Flask-Testing (Dev only)

Quickstart

Ensure you have MongoDB installed. On Mac, thats super easy with Homebrew:

brew install mongodb

Then create your environment and run the project:

$ virtualenv -p `which python3` env
$ . env/bin/activate
$(env) make setup
$(env) make run

An admin user can be created with:

make superuser

Models

Models are created using MongoEngine and are put into their own module in the app/models/ directory.

The models to be loaded at runtime must be specified in the MODELS config. By default, this is located in the config/common.py file. The name must match the module file and will be loaded in the order specified.

Example:

MODELS = ('user', 'post', 'comment')

Blueprints

Flask "views" in the form of Blueprints are loaded at runtime. To learn more about Blueprints, you can read the official Flask docs.

Each Blueprint should exist in its own file and have the variable bp available as the Blueprint instance.

The Blueprints are loaded automatically based on the BLUEPRINTS config found in the config/common.py module.

Example config:

BLUEPRINTS = ('main', 'user', 'admin')

Example Blueprint

bp = Blueprint('main', __name__)

@bp.route('/')
def index():
  return render_template('index.html')

Extensions

Extensions are also loaded at runtime and can be any module with a setup function. This is often used to configure other Flask extensions or custom tools that need the app instance.

The extensions are loaded automatically based on the EXTENSIONS config found in the config/common.py module.

Linting & Tests

Linting and tests are highly encouraged. To run them, use:

make quality

You can also run tests without linting with:

make test

And lint without testing using:

make lint

Structure

• app/ Flask project root
• app/forms/ Form definitions for WTForm
• app/extensions/ Modules for automatically setting up extensions at run time
• app/models/ MongoEngine models
• app/static/ Static assets such as CSS, JS etc.
• app/templates/ Jinja HTML templates
• app/views/ Flask Blueprints (routes)
• app/__init__.py Flask app entry point
• config/ All configs here
• config/common.py Configs to be used across all environments
• config/local.py Configs specific to local development
• config/production.py Configs specific to production
• config/test.py Configs specific to testing