Django: access the parent instance from the Inline model admin

Question

How can I access the parent instance from the inline model admin?

My goal is to override the has_add_permission function based on the status of the parent instance. I don't want to allow to add a child if the status of the parent is different than 1.

class ChildInline(admin.TabularInline):
    model = Child
    form = ChildForm

    fields = (
        ...
    )
    extra = 0

    def has_add_permission(self, request):
        # Return True only if the parent has status == 1
        # How to get to the parent instance?
        #return True

class ParentAdmin(admin.ModelAdmin):
    inlines = [ChildInline,]

Answer 1

Django < 2.0 Answer:

Use Django's Request object (which you have access to) to retrieve the request.path_info, then retrieve the PK from the args in the resolve match. Example:

from django.contrib import admin
from django.core.urlresolvers import resolve
from app.models import YourParentModel, YourInlineModel


class YourInlineModelInline(admin.StackedInline):
    model = YourInlineModel

    def get_parent_object_from_request(self, request):
        """
        Returns the parent object from the request or None.

        Note that this only works for Inlines, because the `parent_model`
        is not available in the regular admin.ModelAdmin as an attribute.
        """
        resolved = resolve(request.path_info)
        if resolved.args:
            return self.parent_model.objects.get(pk=resolved.args[0])
        return None

    def has_add_permission(self, request):
        parent = self.get_parent_object_from_request(request)

        # Validate that the parent status is active (1)
        if parent:
            return parent.status == 1

        # No parent - return original has_add_permission() check
        return super(YourInlineModelInline, self).has_add_permission(request)


@admin.register(YourParentModel)
class YourParentModelAdmin(admin.ModelAdmin):
    inlines = [YourInlineModelInline]

Django >= 2.0 Answer:

Credit to Mark Chackerian for the below update:

Use Django's Request object (which you have access to) to retrieve the request.path_info, then retrieve the PK from the args in the resolve match. Example:

from django.contrib import admin
from django.urls import resolve
from app.models import YourParentModel, YourInlineModel


class YourInlineModelInline(admin.StackedInline):
    model = YourInlineModel

    def get_parent_object_from_request(self, request):
        """
        Returns the parent object from the request or None.

        Note that this only works for Inlines, because the `parent_model`
        is not available in the regular admin.ModelAdmin as an attribute.
        """
        resolved = resolve(request.path_info)
        if resolved.args:
            return self.parent_model.objects.get(pk=resolved.args[0])
        return None

    def has_add_permission(self, request):
        parent = self.get_parent_object_from_request(request)

        # Validate that the parent status is active (1)
        if parent:
            return parent.status == 1

        # No parent - return original has_add_permission() check
        return super(YourInlineModelInline, self).has_add_permission(request)


@admin.register(YourParentModel)
class YourParentModelAdmin(admin.ModelAdmin):
    inlines = [YourInlineModelInline]

Answer 2

I think this is a cleaner way to get the parent instance in the inline model.

class ChildInline(admin.TabularInline):
    model = Child
    form = ChildForm

    fields = (...)
    extra = 0

    def get_formset(self, request, obj=None, **kwargs):
        self.parent_obj = obj
        return super(ChildInline, self).get_formset(request, obj, **kwargs)

    def has_add_permission(self, request):
        # Return True only if the parent has status == 1
        return self.parent_obj.status == 1


class ParentAdmin(admin.ModelAdmin):
    inlines = [ChildInline, ]

Answer 3

I tried the solution of Michael B but didn't work for me, I had to use this instead (a small modification that uses kwargs):

def get_parent_object_from_request(self, request):
        """
        Returns the parent object from the request or None.

        Note that this only works for Inlines, because the `parent_model`
        is not available in the regular admin.ModelAdmin as an attribute.
        """
        resolved = resolve(request.path_info)
        if resolved.kwargs:
            return self.parent_model.objects.get(pk=resolved.kwargs["object_id"])
        return None

Answer 4

BaseInlineFormSet has the attribute self.instance which is the reference to the parent object.

In the constructor, the queryset is intialized and filtered using this instance. If you need adjustments, you can change the queryset argument to the constructor or use inlineformset_factory to set the formset up according to your needs.

class BaseInlineFormSet(BaseModelFormSet):
    """A formset for child objects related to a parent."""
    def __init__(self, data=None, files=None, instance=None,
                 save_as_new=False, prefix=None, queryset=None, **kwargs):
        if instance is None:
            self.instance = self.fk.remote_field.model()
        else:
            self.instance = instance
        self.save_as_new = save_as_new
        if queryset is None:
            queryset = self.model._default_manager
        if self.instance.pk is not None:
            qs = queryset.filter(**{self.fk.name: self.instance})
        else:
            qs = queryset.none()
        self.unique_fields = {self.fk.name}
        super().__init__(data, files, prefix=prefix, queryset=qs, **kwargs)

see https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/3.2/_modules/django/forms/models/

If you extends from this, make sure to run super().__init__() before accessing self.instance.