Allow related field in post request in DRF - django

Question

I have created model with many to many relationship and I have join table when I keep additional variable for it:
class BorderStatus(models.Model):
STATUS_CHOICES = [("OP", "OPEN"), ("SEMI", "CAUTION"), ("CLOSED", "CLOSED")]
origin_country = models.ForeignKey(OriginCountry, on_delete=models.CASCADE, default="0")
destination = models.ForeignKey(Country, on_delete=models.CASCADE, default="0")
status = models.CharField(max_length=6, choices=STATUS_CHOICES, default="CLOSED")
extra = 1
class Meta:
unique_together = [("destination", "origin_country")]
verbose_name_plural = "Border Statuses"
def __str__(self):
return (
f"{self.origin_country.origin_country.name} -> {self.destination.name}"
f" ({self.status})"
)
Other models:
# Create your models here.
class Country(models.Model):
name = models.CharField(max_length=100, unique=True, verbose_name='Country')
class Meta:
verbose_name_plural = "Countries"
def __str__(self):
return self.name
class OriginCountry(models.Model):
origin_country = models.ForeignKey(
Country, related_name="origins", on_delete=models.CASCADE
)
destinations = models.ManyToManyField(
Country, related_name="destinations", through="BorderStatus"
)
class Meta:
verbose_name_plural = "Origin Countries"
def __str__(self):
return self.origin_country.name
Here is my serializer for the endpoint:
class BorderStatusEditorSerializer(serializers.ModelSerializer):
"""Create serializer for editing single connection based on origin and destination name- to change status"""
origin_country = serializers.StringRelatedField(read_only=True)
destination = serializers.StringRelatedField(read_only=True)
class Meta:
model = BorderStatus
fields = ('origin_country', 'destination', 'status')
And my endpoint:
class BorderStatusViewSet(viewsets.ModelViewSet):
queryset = BorderStatus.objects.all()
serializer_class = BorderStatusEditorSerializer
filter_backends = (DjangoFilterBackend,)
filter_fields=('origin_country','destination')
The problem Im having is that I cant create any new combination for the BorderStatus model in this serializer via post request.
If I remove the lines:
origin_country = serializers.StringRelatedField(read_only=True)
destination = serializers.StringRelatedField(read_only=True)
Then the form will work, but then I wont have the string representation of those variables, instead I get IDs.
Is there any way to allow request to accept origin_country and destination while being related fields?
EDIT:
To clarify how OriginCountry works, it is has a nested field:
[{ "id": 1
"origin_country": "Canada",
"dest_country": [
{
"id": 1,
"name": "France",
"status": "CLOSED"
},
{
"id": 2,
"name": "Canada",
"status": "OP"
}
]
},
]

Answer 1

You can try to override perform_create method of the viewset to make the necessary adjustments on-the-fly when new entry is posted:
class BorderStatusViewSet(viewsets.ModelViewSet):
queryset = BorderStatus.objects.all()
serializer_class = BorderStatusEditorSerializer
filter_backends = (DjangoFilterBackend,)
filter_fields=('origin_country','destination')
def perform_create(self, serializer):
origin_country, _ = models.Country.get_or_create(name=self.request.data.get('origin_country')
destination, _ = models.Country.get_or_create(name=self.request.data.get('destination')
return serializer.save(origin_country=origin_country, destination=destination)
Maybe you will also need to adjust your serializer to have:
class CountrySerializer(serializers.ModelSerializer):
class Meta:
model = Country
fields = ['name']
class BorderStatusEditorSerializer(serializers.ModelSerializer):
origin_country = CountrySerializer()
destination = CountrySerializer()
...

Answer 2

Yes, I will try to give this combination.
You get this error because of Incorrect Type exception. Django checks data type validation on the serializer. For example here your dest_country returns a list of dicts but in your model it is a primary key (pk)
That's why on post django says : pk value expected, list received
But you can solve this error by using two different serializers (one to post another by default)
1. Create two different serializers
class BorderStatusEditorSerializer(serializers.ModelSerializer):
"""The First serialiser by default"""
origin_country = serializers.StringRelatedField(read_only=True)
destination = serializers.StringRelatedField(read_only=True)
class Meta:
model = BorderStatus
fields = ('origin_country', 'destination', 'status')
class BorderStatusEditorCreateSerializer(serializers.ModelSerializer):
"""The Second serialiser for create"""
class Meta:
model = BorderStatus
fields = ('origin_country', 'destination', 'status')
2.Add get_serializer_class method to for Viewset
class BorderStatusViewSet(viewsets.ModelViewSet):
queryset = BorderStatus.objects.all()
filter_backends = (DjangoFilterBackend,)
filter_fields=('origin_country','destination')
serializer_classes = {
'create': BorderStatusEditorCreateSerializer, # serializer used on post
}
default_serializer_class = BorderStatusEditorSerializer # Your default serializer
def get_serializer_class(self):
return self.serializer_classes.get(self.action, self.default_serializer_class)