Critical Patterns

ALWAYS separate serializers by operation: Read / Create / Update / Include
ALWAYS use filterset_class for complex filtering (not filterset_fields)
ALWAYS validate unknown fields in write serializers (inherit BaseWriteSerializer)
ALWAYS use select_related/prefetch_related in get_queryset() to avoid N+1
ALWAYS handle swagger_fake_view in get_queryset() for schema generation
ALWAYS use @extend_schema_field for OpenAPI docs on SerializerMethodField
NEVER put business logic in serializers - use services/utils
NEVER use auto-increment PKs - use UUIDv4 or UUIDv7
NEVER use trailing slashes in URLs (trailing_slash=False)

Note: swagger_fake_view is specific to drf-spectacular for OpenAPI schema generation.

Implementation Checklist

When implementing a new endpoint, review these patterns in order: