There's no reason you couldn't. It wouldn't be Python, but you could do it by defining a new file format to be parsed by the server (mod_whatever). The earlies

There's no reason you couldn't. It wouldn't be Python, but you could do it by defining a new file format to be parsed by the server (mod_whatever). The earliest Python web frameworks were obsessed with this kind of stunt and it gave rise to a profusion of templating engines, some of which look pretty much exactly like what you are discussing. I think what happened is that people tried it and found that the advantage is not that great, but the disadvantages are substantial for things significantly beyond "hello world".