What's up Python? Django get background tasks, a new REPL, bye bye gunicorn (opens in new tab)

(bitecode.dev)

109 pointskevsamuel1y ago59 comments

59 comments

mg1y ago

What I love about Django is that you can create a Django project with just one file.

You can turn a fresh Debian machine into a running Django web app by just doing:

    apt install -y python3-django apache2 libapache2-mod-wsgi-py3

And then creating the one file Django needs:

/var/www/mysite/mysite/wsgi.py:

    import os
    import django
    from django.core.wsgi import get_wsgi_application
    os.environ.setdefault('DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE', 'mysite.wsgi')
    application = get_wsgi_application()

    ROOT_URLCONF = 'mysite.wsgi'
    SECRET_KEY = 'hello'

    def index(request):
        return django.http.HttpResponse('This is the homepage')

    def cats(request):
        return django.http.HttpResponse('This is the cats page')

    urlpatterns = [
        django.urls.path('', index),
        django.urls.path('cats', cats),
    ]

And then telling Apache where to look for it:

/etc/apache2/sites-enabled/000-default.conf:

    ServerName 127.0.0.1
    WSGIPythonPath /var/www/mysite
    <VirtualHost *:80>
        WSGIScriptAlias / /var/www/mysite/mysite/wsgi.py
        <Directory /var/www/mysite/mysite>
            <Files wsgi.py>
                Require all granted
            </Files>
        </Directory>
    </VirtualHost>

And voilá, you have a running Django application, which you can expand upon to any size and complexity.

If you want to try it in a docker container, you can run

    docker run -it --rm -p80:80 debian:12

perform the steps above and then access the Django application at 127.0.0.1

nomilk1y ago

Blown away this is possible. When I was starting to learn to code and was overwhelmed when learning all the bits and pieces of rails, I wondered if everything necessary to run a very small app could be placed in a single file. I guess this is the answer, but in python/django instead of ruby/rails. It would be a fun exercise in ruby/rails too (not totally sure if it's possible, but suspect it may be, albeit probably resulting in a larger file than the one you give above!)

cassiogo1y ago

Not that I think this is pratical or even looks good, but its also doable with rails

  require 'bundler/inline'

  gemfile(true) do
    source 'https://rubygems.org'

    gem 'rails', '~> 7.1'
    gem "sqlite3", "~> 1.4"
  end

  require 'rails'
  require 'active_record/railtie'
  database = 'app_development.sqlite3'

  ENV['DATABASE_URL'] = "sqlite3:#{database}"
  ActiveRecord::Base.establish_connection(adapter: 'sqlite3', database: database)
  ActiveRecord::Schema.define do
    create_table :my_table, force: true do |t|
      t.integer :my_table_id
    end
  end

  class App < Rails::Application
    routes.append do
      root to: 'home#index'
    end
  end

  class HomeController < ActionController::Base
    def index
      render inline: 'HOME'
    end
  end

  App.initialize!

  run App

For very small apps on ruby land sinatra and roda are the right choices. On python the choice would be flask instead of the single file django.