1Paste provides several pieces of "middleware" (or filters) that can be nested
2to build web applications.  Each piece of middleware uses the WSGI (`PEP 333`_)
3interface, and should be compatible with other middleware based on those
4interfaces.
5
6.. _PEP 333: http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0333.html
7
8* `Paste project at Bitbucket (source code, bug tracker)
9  <https://bitbucket.org/ianb/paste/>`_
10* `Paste on the Python Cheeseshop (PyPI)
11  <https://pypi.python.org/pypi/Paste>`_
12* `Paste documentation
13  <http://pythonpaste.org/>`_
14
15See also:
16
17* `PasteDeploy <http://pythonpaste.org/deploy/>`_
18* `PasteScript <http://pythonpaste.org/script/>`_
19* `WebTest <http://webtest.pythonpaste.org/>`_
20* `WebOb <http://docs.webob.org/>`_
21
22Includes these features...
23
24Testing
25-------
26
27* A fixture for testing WSGI applications conveniently and in-process,
28  in ``paste.fixture``
29
30* A fixture for testing command-line applications, also in
31  ``paste.fixture``
32
33* Check components for WSGI-compliance in ``paste.lint``
34
35Dispatching
36-----------
37
38* Chain and cascade WSGI applications (returning the first non-error
39  response) in ``paste.cascade``
40
41* Dispatch to several WSGI applications based on URL prefixes, in
42  ``paste.urlmap``
43
44* Allow applications to make subrequests and forward requests
45  internally, in ``paste.recursive``
46
47Web Application
48---------------
49
50* Run CGI programs as WSGI applications in ``paste.cgiapp``
51
52* Traverse files and load WSGI applications from ``.py`` files (or
53  static files), in ``paste.urlparser``
54
55* Serve static directories of files, also in ``paste.urlparser``; also
56  in that module serving from Egg resources using ``pkg_resources``.
57
58Tools
59-----
60
61* Catch HTTP-related exceptions (e.g., ``HTTPNotFound``) and turn them
62  into proper responses in ``paste.httpexceptions``
63
64* Several authentication techniques, including HTTP (Basic and
65  Digest), signed cookies, and CAS single-signon, in the
66  ``paste.auth`` package.
67
68* Create sessions in ``paste.session`` and ``paste.flup_session``
69
70* Gzip responses in ``paste.gzip``
71
72* A wide variety of routines for manipulating WSGI requests and
73  producing responses, in ``paste.request``, ``paste.response`` and
74  ``paste.wsgilib``
75
76Debugging Filters
77-----------------
78
79* Catch (optionally email) errors with extended tracebacks (using
80  Zope/ZPT conventions) in ``paste.exceptions``
81
82* Catch errors presenting a `cgitb
83  <http://docs.python.org/2/library/cgitb.html>`_-based
84  output, in ``paste.cgitb_catcher``.
85
86* Profile each request and append profiling information to the HTML,
87  in ``paste.debug.profile``
88
89* Capture ``print`` output and present it in the browser for
90  debugging, in ``paste.debug.prints``
91
92* Validate all HTML output from applications using the `WDG Validator
93  <http://www.htmlhelp.com/tools/validator/>`_, appending any errors
94  or warnings to the page, in ``paste.debug.wdg_validator``
95
96Other Tools
97-----------
98
99* A file monitor to allow restarting the server when files have been
100  updated (for automatic restarting when editing code) in
101  ``paste.reloader``
102
103* A class for generating and traversing URLs, and creating associated
104  HTML code, in ``paste.url``
105
106The official development repo is at https://bitbucket.org/ianb/paste.
107
108For the latest changes see the `news file
109<http://pythonpaste.org/news.html>`_.
110