CORS (Cross-Origin Resource Sharing) allows your frontend and backend to run on different origins (e.g., http://localhost:3000 for the frontend and http://127.0.0.1:8000 for the backend).
Advantages of CORS
- Simplified Development:
- Running the frontend and backend on different origins simplifies development, as they can be started independently and use their respective dev servers.
- Realistic for Production:
- In production, you may host your frontend (e.g., on a CDN or a platform like Netlify) and backend (e.g., on AWS or Azure) on separate domains. Setting up CORS during development mirrors this setup.
- Microservices or Distributed Architecture:
- If you plan to extend ContextCore into a distributed system with multiple APIs or frontend services, CORS becomes essential.
- Flexibility:
- Easier to switch frontend frameworks or backend implementations without tightly coupling them.
How to Set Up CORS in FastAPI
Add CORS middleware to your FastAPI app:
from fastapi import FastAPI
from fastapi.middleware.cors import CORSMiddleware
app = FastAPI()
app.add_middleware(
CORSMiddleware,
allow_origins=["http://localhost:3000"], # Frontend dev server
allow_credentials=True,
allow_methods=["*"], # Allow all HTTP methods
allow_headers=["*"], # Allow all headers
)