Deploying Django at alwaysdata.com

Question

I am new on django. I tried this but I can't deploy. How can I do

#!/usr/bin/python
import sys
import os

base = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)) + '/..'
sys.path.append(base)

os.environ['DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE'] = 'myfirstapp.settings'

import django.core.handlers.wsgi

application = django.core.handlers.wsgi.WSGIHandler() 

---

AddHandler fcgid-script .fcgi
Options +FollowSymLinks
RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^(media/.*)$ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(adminmedia/.*)$ - [L]
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !(cgi-bin/myproject.fcgi)
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ mysite.fcgi/$1 [L]

Answer 1

Here's the alwaysdata wiki entry for setting up Django with fastcgi. Only down-side: it's written in French.

Well, I don't speak French, but what it basically says is:

1. Create a directory named public in the folder of your django project.

2. In that directory create the file django.fcgi with the following content:

   #!/usr/bin/python
   import os, sys
   
   _PROJECT_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)))
   sys.path.insert(0, _PROJECT_DIR)
   sys.path.insert(0, os.path.dirname(_PROJECT_DIR))
   
   _PROJECT_NAME = _PROJECT_DIR.split('/')[-1]
   os.environ['DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE'] = "%s.settings" % _PROJECT_NAME
   
   from django.core.servers.fastcgi import runfastcgi
   runfastcgi(method="threaded", daemonize="false")
   

3. Next, create a .htaccess in the public folder with the following content:

   AddHandler fcgid-script .fcgi
   RewriteEngine On
   RewriteCond %{REQUEST_FILENAME} !-f
   RewriteRule ^(.*)$ django.fcgi/$1 [QSA,L]
   

4. If you're planning to include the django admin interface, create this symbolic link in your public directory:

   ln -s /usr/local/alwaysdata/python/django/1.1/django/contrib/admin/media/ media
   

5. In the end your folder tree hierarchy should somehow look like this:

   myproject/
       __init__.py
       manage.py
       public/
           django.fcgi
           .htaccess
           media/
       settings.py
       urls.py
       myapp/
           views.py
           models.py
   

Hope this helps. I talked with the admin, and he said he will soon provide an English wiki. Let's hope this is going to happen anytime soon.

---

UPDATE: There is an English wiki article now.

Answer 2

You are trying to mix two different web server integration methods: fcgi (fast cgi) and wsgi.

Your first snippet is for a wsgi interface with the web server and is the recommended method for integrating Django with Apache. Very good resources (including examples) to help you set this up correctly can be found in the official Django docs How to use Django with Apache and mod_wsgi and the mod_wsgi docs Integration with Django

The second snippet (with AddHandler line) is for fcgi. This is the kind of interface that is more typically used to interface Django with the lighttpd and nginx web servers. Resources for setting up fcgi interface can be found in official Django docs How to use Django with FastCGI, SCGI, or AJP.

Since it looks like alwaysdata.com only uses FastCGI (fcgi) interface you are stuck with this method. It looks like there are examples on their wiki page Déployer une application Django and particulary you'll need to replace your first (wsgi) snippet with this:

#!/usr/bin/python
import os, sys

_PROJECT_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)))
sys.path.insert(0, _PROJECT_DIR)
sys.path.insert(0, os.path.dirname(_PROJECT_DIR))

_PROJECT_NAME = _PROJECT_DIR.split('/')[-1]
os.environ['DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE'] = "%s.settings" % _PROJECT_NAME

from django.core.servers.fastcgi import runfastcgi
runfastcgi(method="threaded", daemonize="false")