How to configure Django's "staticfiles" app to list directory contents?

Question

I'm using Django's built-in web server, in DEBUG mode.

This is part of my settings.py:

STATIC_ROOT = '/home/user/static_root'
STATIC_URL = '/static/'
STATICFILES_DIRS = (
    '/abs/path/to/static/dir',
)
STATICFILES_FINDERS = (
    'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.FileSystemFinder',
    'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.AppDirectoriesFinder',
)

If I access http://localhost:8000/static/png/, I would expect to see a list of files available in /abs/path/to/static/dir/png. Instead I get a 404 error "Directory indexes are not allowed here."

Now if I access the files directly, e.g. http://localhost:8000/static/png/test.png, it works.

I've already checked some answers (here) without success.

So, does anyone know how to configure Django such that the staticfiles app lists directory contents?

Answer 1

Just for completeness since it might help others, this is what I did to solve the problem.

Following @Hedde's answer, I went to use show_indexes:

settings.py

• Kept all the configuration the same (i.e. all the STATIC* variables)
• Removed 'django.contrib.staticfiles' from INSTALLED_APPS

The problem is that I cannot specify the show_indexes parameter using Django's "built-in" method for static file configuration (via settings.py). By having 'django.contrib.staticfiles' in INSTALLED_APPS, Django would create the static file handler with show_indexes = False, ignoring my urlpatterns.

urls.py

Added the following to urlpatterns:

url(regex  = r'^%s(?P<path>.*)$' % settings.STATIC_URL[1:], 
    view   = 'django.views.static.serve', 
    kwargs = {'document_root': '/abs/path/to/static/dir',
              'show_indexes' : True})