Dict as a model field

Question

I want to add a dict field to a model, display the dict on the admin, and be able to edit it from the admin.

For example, I have a relationship

dict = { 'sister' : rel_score, 'mother' : rel_score, 'father': rel_score}

where rel_score (default = 0) is the score for each relationship. I want to store this dict to my model and display it in admin, so that I can assign these rel_score for each relationship on my admin.

Also, any example of how to assign scores (prioritize) to different elements, and return values according to these assigned scores would be really helpful.

Answer 1

It's not really possible to have a DictField since the underlying database won't support that type of data structure.

You could have a RelationshipScore model to store your relationships and a ForeignKey from it to your existing model (I'll use user as an example). eg:

Class RelationshipScore(models.Model):
    user = models.ForeignKey(User)

    relationship = models.CharField(max_length=50, primary_key=True)
    score = models.IntegerField()

You could then add functions to your existing model to get the values:

class User(models.Model):
    def get_relationship(self, rel):
        return RelationshipScore.objects.get(relationship=rel, user=self)
    def get_lowest_relationship(self):
        return RelationshipScore.objects.filter(user=self).order_by("-score")[0]

Answer 2

As of Django 1.8, postgres users also have the option of using an HStore field.

A field for storing mappings of strings to strings. The Python data type used is a dict.