Caktus Blog

Editor’s note: This post was updated on July 17th, 2025, to use the PATH_add hook for direnv and to recommend including uv sync --locked in your .envrc file.

Three Cakti recently attended DjangoCon Europe 2025 in Dublin and it was a wonderful experience! It was great to see and chat with various Django community members we usually only see once or twice a year. Beyond that, we were most impressed by the consistently high quality of the talks throughout all three days of the conference. It was a pleasure to listen to so many excellent presentations, including the lightning talks at the end of each day. Here are some of our favorite talks.

Chicago Like a Local: Hidden Gems & Unique Experiences (Part 2)

DjangoCon US 2025 is getting closer, and while we’ve covered some classic must-see spots in Part 1, there’s so much more to explore beyond the typical tourist attractions. If you’re looking for unique experiences, quirky hidden gems, and places where locals actually hang out, this guide is for you.

Django and its admin interface are a big part of why Caktus uses Django, but the admin's ability to log database changes is limited. For example, it shows only changes made via the Django admin, not via other parts of the site.

Let’s jump into it!

At Caktus, we’re always looking for tools that help us streamline our workflows, increase productivity, and make our day-to-day tasks more efficient. Whether you’re managing projects, writing code, or debugging, the right tools can make all the difference. Here are some of our favorite tools that we love using to get the job done!

Upgrading projects is somewhat equivalent to flossing, you know you have to do it, but rarely make time for it. After all, if the project is in active development, there are exciting new features to build. And we all know that new features > project upgrades. Well not to worry, Caktus wants to make you aware of some tools that will save you from considerable repetitive work & time while simultaneously modernizing your codebase. Combined, these tools will automate part of the upgrade process, decreasing the likelihood of neglecting parts of the codebase.

Introduction

regexp_matches() and regexp_match() are two similar string functions that support regular expression matching directly in the PostgreSQL database. regexp_matches() was added in PostgreSQL 8.3, and regexp_match() was added in PostgreSQL 10 (keep reading to see how ChatGPT struggled to answer this question).

At Caktus, we use Helm charts to simplify our deployment process for Django projects. Helm is a package manager for Kubernetes, and using Helm charts allows us to automate the process of writing Kubernetes configuration files for our Django applications. We use it together with GitHub Actions and Ansible to streamline our deployment processes.

Often the applications we build at Caktus deal with large sets of Django objects. The attributes of these objects can vary, and may need updating in certain instances. One of the best ways to manage this data is via django-import-export, which is a tool that creates a way to perform these bulk updates with a file upload such as a .csv or .xlsx file.

This past week, I learned that it's possible to run Tailscale in a local docker-compose.yml on a developer's workstation, and securely allow access to services in the docker-compose file to other users on your Tailnet.