Django community: Community blog posts RSS
This page, updated regularly, aggregates Community blog posts from the Django community.
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Hollywood Draft Private League Launch!
This new game allows you to play in a more traditional fantasy game model where you draft from a pool celebrities. This allows fun things like draft parties, benching players and all the regular things those familiar with fantasy sport already know. Give the game a spin with a few friends and let me know what you think! Hint: If you're really into fantasy sports, this is a great game to play with your girlfriend to let her feel involved. -
Building Better Web Services With Django (Part 2)
In the first part I talked about using the Content-Type and Accept HTTP headers to allow a single website to be use both by humans and programs. In the previous part I gave a decorator which can be used to make working with JSON very easy. For our use though this isn’t great because a [...] -
MyEmailDraft.com Launched!
The site solves one simple problem. Messy email based fantasy drafts. Our goal was to make something as simple to setup as an email draft but without any of the downside. If you're into fantasy games and have done an email draft before, some of the problems with email drafts are: ♦ Email storm. Everyone does a reply-all so you get emailed on every pick. ♦ Users forget they are up because they start ignoring emails (see email storm). ♦ Emails start to look like this. Making it very difficult to find what was picked and make your own pick. ♦ Some users forget "reply all" thereby leaving it up to the one person that got the email to continue the draft. ♦ Creating a random draft order is a big pain for the league owner. Once you enter all the email address, just as you would into your email program, you're ready to go. The league home page is all AJAX based so it refreshes on its own to give you status updates and lets you make picks quickly using a very light interface. Of course, you can still make picks via email and the system will automatically handle those too. No login\password is … -
dojo.beer in Amsterdam and Munich
Some of the dojo guys are traveling around the world, and we are happy to get Pete Higgins, Dylan Schiemann and Nikolai Onken together for a couple of dojo.beers. 1) Amsterdam, 27th April, 19:00 – the first one will be already next week in Amsterdam on Monday the 27th April, this will be a meetup in a restaurant and probably a lot of tech and geek talk and some beer. 2) Munich, 9th May, all day – the second one will be a free full-day event in Munich with talks and time to hang out and hack together. It will take place on the 9th May, starting at around 12:00 in the rooms of the SKYTEC AG (Keltenring 11, 82041 Oberhaching). Amsterdam, 27th April Detailed information All the following info are from the dojocampus.org post. The first dojo.beer() in The Netherlands will be held on April 27th in Amsterdam. Hopefully this will be the beginning of a series of fun Dojo events bringing people from The Netherlands and around together, who work with Dojo, enjoy using Dojo and like everything around the Web. As a special guest we will have both Dylan Schiemann (SitePen, Dojo Co-Founder) and Peter Higgins (Dojo … -
More buildout notes
I got a lot of great feedback on my buildout tutorial I posted last week. In general, the comments there have some excellent tips, tricks, and extra pointer, so check ‘em out. After reading the comments and a few more I got over email, I thought I’d share a selected grab-bag of updates, hints, and details for those fooling around with Buildout and Django. Django trove identifier James Bennett pointed out that Django has its very own PyPI classification, Framework :: Django. -
Nashvegas Issues
GitHub has added integrated issue tracking: So, in an effort to sample this awesomeness, I have converted my TODO file to issues for Nashvegas. Please vote on the ones you care about and enter new ones that would be helpful for you. -
Nashvegas Issues
GitHub has added integrated issue tracking: So, in an effort to sample this awesomeness, I have converted my TODO file to issues for Nashvegas. Please vote on the ones you care about and enter new ones that would be helpful for you. -
Installing GeoDjango with PostgreSQL and zc.buildout
The installation of the PostgreSQL requirements is somewhat daunting. I've spent a bit of time putting together a buildout.cfg to try to make this easier. -
Installing GeoDjango with PostgreSQL and zc.buildout
I've been wanting to play with GeoDjango for a while, since my database of choice (PostgreSQL) has excellent spatial support. However, getting all the dependencies up and running is pretty complicated. I've been working on a buildout to get at least most of the steps done for you. There are a couple of manual steps at the end, which I hope to automate when I next have time to work on this. The buildout installs the following items: PostgreSQL PostGIS GDAL Proj GEOS psycopg2 Django It should also perform initial setup of the PostGIS database template, loading some sample SQL files, and sets up some convenience symlinks for the PostgreSQL command-line programs. It's not finished - in particular, it just assumes that the user running the buildout is to be used as the database owner and such like. Anyway, here it is: [buildout]parts = postgresql postgis gdal init-pgsql pgsql-symlinks django eggs = psycopg2[postgresql]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://wwwmaster.postgresql.org/redir/198/h/source/v8.3.7/postgresql-8.3.7.tar.gzextra_options = --with-readline --enable-thread-safety [postgis]recipe = hexagonit.recipe.cmmiurl = http://postgis.refractions.net/download/postgis-1.3.5.tar.gzconfigure-options = --with-pgsql=${postgresql:location}/bin/pg_config --with-geos=${geos:location}/bin/geos-config --with-proj=${proj:location}[proj]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://download.osgeo.org/proj/proj-4.6.1.tar.gz[geos]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://download.osgeo.org/geos/geos-3.0.3.tar.bz2[gdal]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://download.osgeo.org/gdal/gdal-1.6.0.tar.gzextra_options = --with-python --with-geos=${geos:location}/bin/geos-config[init-pgsql]recipe = iw.recipe.cmdon_install = trueon_update = falsecmds = ${postgresql:location}/bin/initdb -D ${postgresql:location}/var/data -E UNICODE ${postgresql:location}/bin/pg_ctl -D ${postgresql:location}/var/data … -
Installing GeoDjango with PostgreSQL and zc.buildout
I've been wanting to play with GeoDjango for a while, since my database of choice (PostgreSQL) has excellent spatial support. However, getting all the dependencies up and running is pretty complicated. I've been working on a buildout to get at least most of the steps done for you. There are a couple of manual steps at the end, which I hope to automate when I next have time to work on this. The buildout installs the following items: PostgreSQL PostGIS GDAL Proj GEOS psycopg2 Django It should also perform initial setup of the PostGIS database template, loading some sample SQL files, and sets up some convenience symlinks for the PostgreSQL command-line programs. It's not finished - in particular, it just assumes that the user running the buildout is to be used as the database owner and such like. Anyway, here it is: [buildout]parts = postgresql postgis gdal init-pgsql pgsql-symlinks django eggs = psycopg2[postgresql]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://wwwmaster.postgresql.org/redir/198/h/source/v8.3.7/postgresql-8.3.7.tar.gzextra_options = --with-readline --enable-thread-safety [postgis]recipe = hexagonit.recipe.cmmiurl = http://postgis.refractions.net/download/postgis-1.3.5.tar.gzconfigure-options = --with-pgsql=${postgresql:location}/bin/pg_config --with-geos=${geos:location}/bin/geos-config --with-proj=${proj:location}[proj]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://download.osgeo.org/proj/proj-4.6.1.tar.gz[geos]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://download.osgeo.org/geos/geos-3.0.3.tar.bz2[gdal]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://download.osgeo.org/gdal/gdal-1.6.0.tar.gzextra_options = --with-python --with-geos=${geos:location}/bin/geos-config[init-pgsql]recipe = iw.recipe.cmdon_install = trueon_update = falsecmds = ${postgresql:location}/bin/initdb -D ${postgresql:location}/var/data -E UNICODE ${postgresql:location}/bin/pg_ctl -D ${postgresql:location}/var/data … -
Installing GeoDjango with PostgreSQL and zc.buildout
I've been wanting to play with GeoDjango for a while, since my database of choice (PostgreSQL) has excellent spatial support. However, getting all the dependencies up and running is pretty complicated. I've been working on a buildout to get at least most of the steps done for you. There are a couple of manual steps at the end, which I hope to automate when I next have time to work on this. The buildout installs the following items: PostgreSQL PostGIS GDAL Proj GEOS psycopg2 Django It should also perform initial setup of the PostGIS database template, loading some sample SQL files, and sets up some convenience symlinks for the PostgreSQL command-line programs. It's not finished - in particular, it just assumes that the user running the buildout is to be used as the database owner and such like. Anyway, here it is: [buildout]parts = postgresql postgis gdal init-pgsql pgsql-symlinks django eggs = psycopg2[postgresql]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://wwwmaster.postgresql.org/redir/198/h/source/v8.3.7/postgresql-8.3.7.tar.gzextra_options = --with-readline --enable-thread-safety [postgis]recipe = hexagonit.recipe.cmmiurl = http://postgis.refractions.net/download/postgis-1.3.5.tar.gzconfigure-options = --with-pgsql=${postgresql:location}/bin/pg_config --with-geos=${geos:location}/bin/geos-config --with-proj=${proj:location}[proj]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://download.osgeo.org/proj/proj-4.6.1.tar.gz[geos]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://download.osgeo.org/geos/geos-3.0.3.tar.bz2[gdal]recipe = zc.recipe.cmmiurl = http://download.osgeo.org/gdal/gdal-1.6.0.tar.gzextra_options = --with-python --with-geos=${geos:location}/bin/geos-config[init-pgsql]recipe = iw.recipe.cmdon_install = trueon_update = falsecmds = ${postgresql:location}/bin/initdb -D ${postgresql:location}/var/data -E UNICODE ${postgresql:location}/bin/pg_ctl -D ${postgresql:location}/var/data … -
Ajax Validation Aministrivia
Small administrative note, now that Github has it's own issue tracker users wishing to report issues with django-ajax-validation can now do so on Github, instead of the old Google Code page. Django-filter users can also report issues on its Github page, in place of the former system of "message or email me", which, though functional, wasn't very convenient. -
Developing Django apps with zc.buildout
Developing a Django app with zc.buildout Over the weekend I put together django-shorturls, the latest in a series of small plugable Django apps I’ve written. This time, though, I used zc.buildout and djangorecipe to build, test, package, and distribute the app, and (with the exception of a few annoyances) it’s an exceedingly civilized way to develop an app. In the interest of helping improve Buildout’s still-nascent documentation, I documented my steps along the way. -
How to make the Django 500 (server error) view useful
Django is pretty awesome. It comes with a lot of view functions built-in. One of these functions is the 500 (server error) view. Quoting the Django documentation for the 500 view: Django executes special-case behavior in the case of runtime errors in view code. If a view results in an exception, Django will, by default, call [...] -
Nobody expects Python packaging!
Python has one package distribution system: source files and setup.py install. And easy_install. Python has two package distribution systems: setup.py install and easy_install. And zc.buildout. Python has three package distribution systems: setup.py install, easy_install, and zc.buildout. And pip. Amongst Python’s package distribution are such diverse elements as… -
Sum for the range of a column in Excel
Working on my current project, one requirement came out which made me all the more appreciative of django's nice array of built-in filters. I generated an Excel report for my clients which is generated from html. Good and nice. Then one of them said, hey can the Excel report have a row which outputs the sum of the whole column of say the column E? Something usual and easy in Excel but stumped me for a while of how to do it from html to excel. For the most part it was trying to figure out how to include that SUM formula at my html code. A little visit to M$ support center got me the help I needed and then it was back to nice plethora of filters django has .... Turns out that you can include formula into a cell (or a table column in this case) by simply doing something like this '=SUM(E2:E70)' just after the opening tags for your column. This part actually took the longest for me as I did not really know how to do it correctly. My last row in this case was dynamic because it depended on the number of rows generated … -
Turning off django signals
While I'm on the subject, how to turn off signals that you don't want on. -
web.py, Dreamhost, and the django templating framework
Getting web.py working properly on Dreamhost was a real pain, especially since the wiki article on the subject was flat out wrong in several places. I ended up choosing to use fcgi for talking to apache, which is good for performance but not optimal for development work (you sometimes have to kill the process and [...] -
Dallas Django 1.1 Sprint
Djangonauts of Dallas rejoice! We are joining forces to have our very first Django Sprint event for the upcoming 1.1 release. For more info: When: Saturday, April 18, 2009 at 9:00am to Sunday, April 19, 2009 at 5:00pm Where: Cohabitat 2517 Thomas Ave. Dallas, TX Facebook Event Page: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=81320026376&ref=nf -
Hooray for standards
Hey, look, it’s a new W3C site. Hm: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> Ooh, XHTML… $ curl -sI http://beta.w3.org/ | grep 'Content-Type' Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8 Heh. -
Easier Translations with django-rosetta
I just found out about this Django application called django-rosetta that uses the Google AJAX Language API to suggest translations for translatable strings in your project. Even more interesting is the admin-like interface it creates to enter translations directly from a browser - and it doesn’t need any database tables, everything is directly written to translation files. I didn’t try it out yet, but if it works as advertised, it could become one of my default applications. Visit the bookmark » -
Building Better Web Services With Django (Part 1)
Building a RESTful webservice is pretty straight-forward with Django, but in many cases you want to have both a human readable website and a machine readable api. A lot of websites solve this problem by using www.x.com as the human site, an api.x.com as the machine site. They also will typically have different structures to [...] -
Django Site of the Week: The A.V. Club
It's been a while, but the Django Site of the Week is back. This week I spoke to Tom Tobin, developer at satire news site The Onion, about their Django-powered site The A.V. Club. Originally a Drupal website, Tom and his team converted the site to Django over a period odds three months. So how do they handle a million unique views a month? Read the article to find out. -
Django Site of the Week - The A.V. Club
For various reasons I haven't been able to post a Django Site of the Week for quite a while now, which is a little embarrassing. I've had this little interview sitting in my inbox for over a month, and I've only just been able to write it up and get it published. Just about everybody online has come across The Onion at some stage. Whether you have interpreted a satirical news story as the truth, or just read it for a laugh, The Onion is a staple of online publishing. A less-satirical yet still enjoyable feature of The Onion is The A.V. Club. Originally part of the printed Onion newspaper and then a PHP-powered Drupal based website, The A.V. Club is now running on Django - and the team who built it love Django to bits. This week, I spoke to Tom Tobin, web developer at The Onion. We discussed how they built the A.V. Club website, how they manage with a million unique visitors a month, and what their plans are for the future of The Onion's online presence. You can read the interview and leave your comments at the Django Site of the Week Website. -
Django Site of the Week - The A.V. Club
For various reasons I haven't been able to post a Django Site of the Week for quite a while now, which is a little embarrassing. I've had this little interview sitting in my inbox for over a month, and I've only just been able to write it up and get …