Model on Caktus Group

How to Switch to a Custom Django User Model Mid-Project

Fri, 26 Apr 2019 16:32:33 +0000

The Django documentation recommends always starting your project with a custom user model (even if it's identical to Django's to begin with), to make it easier to customize later if you need to. But what are you supposed to do if you didn't see this when starting a project, or if you inherited a project without a custom user model and you need to add one?

Using Unsaved Related Models for Sample Data in Django 1.8

Tue, 28 Jul 2015 15:54:33 +0000

Note: In between the time I originally wrote this post and it getting published, a ticket and pull request were opened in Django to remove allow_unsaved_instance_assignment and move validation to the model save() method, which makes much more sense anyways. It's likely this will even be backported to Django 1.8.4. So, if you're using a version of Django that doesn't require this, hopefully you'll never stumble across this post in the first place! If this is still an issue for you, here's the original post:

Migrating to a Custom User Model in Django

Wed, 07 Aug 2013 13:10:00 +0000

UPDATE: Read a newer blog post on this topic.

The new custom user model configuration that arrived in Django makes it relatively straightforward to swap in your own model for the Django user model. In most cases, Django's built-in User model works just fine, but there are times when certain limitations (such as the length of the email field) require a custom user model to be installed. If you're starting out with a custom user model, setup and configuration are relatively straightforward, but if you need to migrate an existing legacy project (e.g., one that started out in Django 1.4 or earlier), there are a few gotchas that you might run into. We did this recently for one of our larger, long-term client projects at Caktus, and here's an outline of how we'd recommend tackling this issue:

Making your Django app more pluggable

Wed, 12 Jun 2013 12:08:27 +0000

This blog post is about ways of doing things in your Django app, and pitfalls to avoid, so your app is easier to plug in to other sites.

Django Fundamentals Bootcamp Recap

Thu, 12 Jul 2012 20:34:03 +0000

On June 8th and 9th, Caktus hosted its first Django Fundamentals Bootcamp. The Caktus team developed the idea for the course, which was a crossword drill application, and has been developing the structure and content of the course over the past year. The bootcamp was designed to teach programmers who have experience in programming with different languages and introduce them to the fundamentals of building a web application with Django. We created an interactive environment where the instructors and students were able to communicate with one another which solved the issue of how to begin developing in an unfamiliar language.

OpenBlock Geocoder, Part 1: Data Model and Geocoding

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 16:17:20 +0000

As Tobias mentioned in Scraping Data and Web Standards, Caktus is collaborating with the UNC School of Journalism to help develop Open Rural (the code is on GitHub). Open Rural hopes to help rural newspapers in North Carolina leverage OpenBlock. This blog post is the first of several covering the internals of OpenBlock and, specifically, the geocoder.

Simplifying the Testing of Unmanaged Database Models in Django (Updated for Django 4.2 in 2024)

Fri, 24 Sep 2010 15:01:09 +0000

Editor's note: This post was originally published in September, 2010 and was updated in December, 2024 to incorporate changes in Django and improvements suggested by our readers. It has also been tested for compatibility as of the Django 4.2 release.

Creating recursive, symmetrical many-to-many relationships in Django

Fri, 14 Aug 2009 18:10:43 +0000

In Django, a recursive many-to-many relationship is a ManyToManyField that points to the same model in which it's defined ('self'). A symmetrical relationship is one in where, when a.contacts = [b], a is in b.contacts.

Migrating from django-photologue 1.x to 2.x

Fri, 27 Mar 2009 17:52:30 +0000

We're in the process of updating a web app for a client that was built last year about this time using Django and Photologue. Needless to say, there have been a lot of changes to both over the past year!

Why Caktus Uses Django

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 15:45:31 +0000

Here at Caktus, we use the popular Django web framework for a lot of our custom web application development. We don't use Django simply because it's popular, easy to learn, or happened to be the first thing we found. We've written web apps in PHP, Java, and Ruby on Rails--all before we discovered Django--but were never quite satisfied. Following are just a few of the reasons that we both enjoy working with Django and believe it gives you (the client) the best end-product.

Asterisk CDR & Django integration with ODBC

Mon, 13 Oct 2008 14:58:09 +0000

Tobias already mentioned how Caktus uses Asterisk as our PBX. He also mentioned how we tested various frontends both for managing the asterisk configuration and interacting with asterisk to, for example, check our voicemail. We were inticed by some of the client management solutions that we could plumb up with asterisk. Caktus has a loose administration structure, which allows us to be flexible and not have levels of managers between clients and coders. But, this flexiblility can leave loose ends unchecked when the person in charge of a project is distracted for a day or two. We saw this as an opportunity where Caktus could add a level of group accountability and use some neat technology. We also wanted a tool that would integrate well with our current homegrown DjangoERP/CRM as well as Trac, our prefered tool for project management. So, we decided to write some sweet code.

Database Explained for the Business Professional

Fri, 22 Feb 2008 08:23:58 +0000

One problem with marketing is that it introduces pseudo-false concepts, arbitrarily divorces necessarily wed ones, and leaves out all the gory details. We recently had a client ask us,