Django and query string parameters

Question

Assuming I have a 'get_item' view, how do I write the URL pattern for the following php style of URL?

http://example.com/get_item/?id=2&type=foo&color=bar

(I am not using the standard 'nice' type of URL ie: http://example.com/get_item/2/foo/bar as it is not practical)

Specifically, how do I make the view respond when the user types the above in a browser, and how do I collect the parameters and use it in my view?

I tried to at least get the id part right but to no avail. The view won't run when I type this in my browser http://example.com/get_item?id=2

My url pattern:

(r'^get_item/id(?P<id>\d+)$', get_item)

My view:

def get_item(request):
    id = request.GET.get('id', None)
    xxxxxx

In short, how do I implement Php's style of url pattern with query string parameters in django?

Answer 1

Make your pattern like this:

(r'^get_item/$', get_item) 

And in your view:

def get_item(request):     id = int(request.GET.get('id'))     type = request.GET.get('type', 'default') 

Django processes the query string automatically and makes its parameter/value pairs available to the view. No configuration required. The URL pattern refers to the base URL only, the query string is implicit.

For normal Django style, however, you should put the id/slug in the base URL and not in the query string! Use the query parameters eg. for filtering a list view, for determining the current page etc...

Answer 2

You just need to change your url pattern to:

(r'^get_item/$', get_item)

And your view code will work. In Django the url pattern matching is used for the actual path not the querystring.