README.md

June 1, 2026 · View on GitHub

Horse is an Express-inspired web framework for Delphi and Lazarus.
Designed to ease things up for fast development in a minimalist way and with high performance.

Read this in English or Português (BR).

⚙️ Installation

Installation is done using the boss install command:

boss install horse

(Optional) Install the Horse Wizard for IDE integration.

⚡️ Quickstart Delphi

uses Horse;

begin
  THorse.Get('/ping',
    procedure(Req: THorseRequest; Res: THorseResponse)
    begin
      Res.Send('pong');
    end);

  THorse.Listen(9000);
end.

⚡️ Quickstart Lazarus

{$MODE DELPHI}{$H+}

uses Horse;

procedure GetPing(Req: THorseRequest; Res: THorseResponse);
begin
  Res.Send('Pong');
end;

begin
  THorse.Get('/ping', GetPing);
  THorse.Listen(9000);
end.

📖 Documentation

The full guide lives in doc/ — a small wiki that complements the quick reference below:

Topic	Read
First server, install paths, Delphi/Lazarus setup	Getting Started
Defining routes, route params, route groups, query strings	Routing
`THorseRequest` / `THorseResponse` — body, headers, cookies, sessions, status, streaming	Request & Response
Using middleware, registration order, the `Next` proc	Middleware
Writing & publishing your own middleware — skeleton, thread safety, Provider neutrality, Boss packaging	Writing a Middleware
Choosing a transport provider — Indy (default), CrossSocket, mORMot2, Apache, ISAPI, CGI, daemons	Providers
Deploy as Console / VCL / Daemon / Windows Service / LCL / HTTPApplication — one-page recipe	Deployment Cheatsheet
Full middleware catalogue with extended descriptions	Middleware Ecosystem
Supported Delphi / FPC versions and platforms	Compiler Support

A provider is the HTTP transport that owns the socket and hands requests to your route handlers. The same handler code runs under any provider — you select one at compile time via a Conditional Define. The default Provider depends on the compiler: Indy on Delphi (for Console / VCL / Daemon), fphttpserver on FPC (for Daemon / HTTPApplication / LCL). The optional CrossSocket and mORMot2 Providers replace both with async IOCP / epoll / kqueue I/O.

Provider	Compiler define	Delphi	Lazarus
Indy (Delphi default for self-hosted)	(none)	✔️	n/a
`fphttpserver` (FPC default for self-hosted)	(none)	n/a	✔️
🆕 horse-provider-crosssocket	`HORSE_CROSSSOCKET`	✔️	✔️
🆕 horse-provider-mormot	`HORSE_PROVIDER_MORMOT`	✔️	✔️

Note — Apache / ISAPI / CGI / FastCGI Application types (below) do not use any of these Providers. The host process (Apache, IIS, the web server) owns the socket; Horse runs in-process. See Providers & Application types for the full model.

Delphi-Cross-Socket installation — clone winddriver/Delphi-Cross-Socket (upstream) plus cnpack/cnvcl/.../Crypto for the required CnPack/Crypto units, and add search paths to your project. Three previously-fork-only bug fixes have been merged into upstream as of 2026-Q2, so the upstream mainline is correct for general use. For server-side mutual TLS (SSLVerifyPeer = True + SSLCACertFile = ...) use the pre-built release freitasjca/Delphi-Cross-Socket v1.0.3 — single clone, CnPack bundled, mTLS APIs (SetCACertificateFile + SetVerifyPeer) ready to use. See horse-provider-crosssocket Installation for the full two-path breakdown.

🎯 Application types

How the binary is packaged and started. Self-hosted types run under the chosen Provider above; host-managed types delegate the socket to the web server, which then becomes the transport.

Application type	Compiler define	Delphi	Lazarus
Self-hosted (uses the selected Provider)
Console (default)	(none)	✔️	✔️
VCL	`HORSE_VCL`	✔️	❌
Daemon — Windows Service	`HORSE_DAEMON`	✔️	n/a
Daemon — Linux daemon (systemd)	`HORSE_DAEMON`	✔️	✔️
LCL (Lazarus GUI)	`HORSE_LCL`	❌	✔️
HTTPApplication (FPC)	(FPC default)	❌	✔️
Host-managed (the web server owns the socket; Provider above is unused)
Apache module	`HORSE_APACHE`	✔️	✔️
ISAPI (IIS)	`HORSE_ISAPI`	✔️	❌
CGI	`HORSE_CGI`	✔️	✔️
FastCGI	`HORSE_FCGI`	✔️	✔️

Note – HORSE_DAEMON is a platform‑adaptive application type:

On Windows → compiles as a Windows Service (Vcl.SvcMgr.TService + SCM)

On Linux → compiles as a systemd daemon (uses signal(SIGTERM) + systemd)

“Daemon” is the Unix‑native term; Windows has no exact equivalent, so the same define name is used across platforms.

See Providers for the full compatibility matrix and how to combine Provider × Application type.

🧬 Official Middlewares

For a more maintainable middleware ecosystem, we've put official middlewares into separate repositories:

Middleware	Delphi	Lazarus
horse/json	✔️	✔️
horse/basic-auth	✔️	✔️
horse/cors	✔️	✔️
horse/stream	✔️	✔️
horse/jwt	✔️	✔️
horse/exception	✔️	✔️
horse/logger	✔️	✔️
horse/compression	✔️	✔️

🌱 Third Party Middlewares

This is a list of middlewares that are created by the Horse community, please create a PR if you want to see yours!

Middleware	Delphi	Lazarus
bittencourtthulio/etag	✔️	✔️
bittencourtthulio/paginate	✔️	✔️
bittencourtthulio/cachecontrol	✔️	❌
gabrielbaltazar/gbswagger	✔️	❌
willhubner/socketIO	✔️	❌
dliocode/ratelimit	✔️	❌
dliocode/slowdown	✔️	❌
giorgiobazzo/upload	✔️	❌
dliocode/query	✔️	❌
CarlosHe/healthcheck	✔️	❌
CarlosHe/staticfiles	✔️	❌
CachopaWeb/horse-server-static	✔️	✔️
arvanus/horse-exception-logger	✔️	✔️
claudneysessa/Horse-CSResponsePagination	✔️	❌
claudneysessa/Horse-XSuperObjects	✔️	❌
andre-djsystem/horse-bearer-auth	✔️	✔️
andre-djsystem/horse-manipulate-request	✔️	✔️
andre-djsystem/horse-manipulate-response	✔️	✔️
antoniojmsjr/Horse-IPGeoLocation	✔️	❌
antoniojmsjr/Horse-XMLDoc	✔️	❌
isaquepinheiro/horse-jsonbr	✔️	❌
IagooCesaar/Horse-JsonInterceptor	✔️	❌
dliocode/horse-datalogger	✔️	❌
marcobreveglieri/horse-prometheus-metrics	✔️	❌
weslleycapelari/horse-documentation	✔️	❌
weslleycapelari/horse-validator	✔️	❌