Master FastAPI at engineering depth - ASGI foundations, Pydantic validation, dependency injection, middleware, response models, background tasks, testing, and router organisation for production APIs.
Master Flask at engineering depth - application factory pattern, request context proxies, routing, Blueprints, error handlers, testing with test_client, configuration management, and the extension ecosystem for building production-grade REST APIs.
Master HTTP/1.1 at the byte level - request/response wire format, method semantics, status code families, critical headers, connection pooling, the requests and httpx libraries, HTTP/2 multiplexing, and why every production client needs explicit timeouts.
Master JSON serialization in Python at engineering depth - custom encoders, datetime/Decimal/UUID handling, orjson and msgspec for high-throughput APIs, NDJSON streaming, content negotiation, and why float precision silently destroys financial data.
Master middleware at engineering depth - WSGI vs ASGI middleware, the onion model, request ID propagation, timing, structured logging, CORS, rate limiting with Redis, JWT authentication, and when to use middleware vs dependency injection.
Master HTTP at the wire level, REST design principles, Flask, FastAPI, request/response lifecycle, middleware, JSON serialization, and Pydantic validation - the complete engineering foundation for building production web APIs in Python.
Two production-focused projects for Module 06 - a fully tested Task Management REST API with FastAPI and SQLAlchemy, and a local deployment stack with Docker, Nginx, PostgreSQL, and Alembic migrations.
Build a production-quality Task Management REST API with FastAPI, Pydantic v2, SQLAlchemy, pytest TestClient, RFC 7807 error responses, request ID middleware, and Docker - full CRUD, pagination, filtering, and OpenAPI docs.
Configure a production-like local deployment stack for the Task Management API - multi-stage Dockerfile, Docker Compose with Nginx and PostgreSQL, Alembic migrations, Pydantic BaseSettings, health checks, graceful shutdown, and a Makefile for operations.
Trace an HTTP request through its full 15+ step lifecycle - DNS, TCP, TLS, load balancer, reverse proxy, ASGI server, middleware, routing, validation, handler, serialisation, and response - with production debugging techniques.
Master REST at engineering depth - Roy Fielding's six constraints, uniform interface, URL design, HTTP method semantics, status codes, pagination patterns, versioning strategies, RFC 7807 error format, and the Richardson Maturity Model.
Master Pydantic v2 at engineering depth - BaseModel, Field constraints, field and model validators, ORM mode, discriminated unions, partial updates for PATCH endpoints, JSON Schema generation, and the model_dump gotchas that silently corrupt production data.
