Manually filling disabled fields of Django ModelForm - django

Question

I am facing the following scenario: I have a Django model class called Contact, which looks something like:
class Contact(models.Model):
first_name = models.CharField(max_length=70)
last_name = models.CharField(max_length=70)
company = models.ForeignKey(Company) // should be disabled in user-facing forms
organizations = models.ManyToManyField(Organization) // should be disabled and hidden in user-facing forms
// some other fields not relevant to this question
Both users of the app and administrators should be able to create objects of type Contact and store it in the database. However, for a user this should be restricted in the way that he cannot freely chose the company field of a Contact object. For this, I have created a base ModelForm called ContactForm, intended to be used by administrators, and a restricted user-facing child class called RestrictedContactForm. The code looks as follows:
class ContactForm(forms.modelForm):
class Meta:
model = Contact
fields = ['first_name', 'last_name', 'company', 'organizations']
class RestrictedContactForm(ContactForm):
class Meta(ContactForm.Meta):
widgets = {'organizations': forms.HiddenInput()}
def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs):
super(RestrictedContactForm, self).__init__(*args, **kwargs)
// Maybe populate company and organization here somehow?
self.fields['company'].disabled = True
self.fields['organization'].disabled = True
The RestrictedContactForm is rendered to the user once he decides to create a new contact. Clearly, as both the company and organization fields are mandatory, they need to be manually injected somehow. It is exactly here where my problem lies: I haven't managed to populate these fields by hand.
Below you can find an outline of the view function implementing the logic of a user initiated creation.
def create_contact(request, company_pk):
company = Company.objects.get(pk=company_pk)
organization = Organization.objects.get(...)
if request.method == 'POST':
// Add company.pk and organization.pk to POST here?
// Pass data dictionary manually populated from POST and
// with company.pl and organization.pk to constructor?
contact_form = RestrictedContactForm(request.POST, request.FILES)
// Add company.pk and organization.pk to contact_form.data
// here (after making it mutable)?
if contact_form.is_valid():
contact_form.save()
return redirect(...)
return render(...)
contact_form = ContactForm(initial={'company': company, 'organizations': organization})
I have already tried every suggestion appearing in the comments above. The form simply never validates. My question hence is, what would be the correct way of doing this? Moreover, is the approach outlined at least conceptually right?
The project uses Django 1.9.

Answer 1

If the company and organization fields are not changeable by the user, then they should not be included in the fields list at all in RestrictedContactForm.
What you can do instead is pass the known values for organization and company into the constructor of the form, and then assign them to the object before you actually create it in the database.
class RestrictedContactForm(ContactForm):
class Meta(ContactForm.Meta):
fields = ['first_name', 'last_name', ]
def __init__(self, company, organization, *args, **kwargs):
super(RestrictedContactForm, self).__init__(*args, **kwargs)
self.company = company
self.organization = organization
def save(self, commit=True):
instance = super(RestrictedContactForm, self).save(commit=False)
if not instance.pk:
instance.company = self.company
instance.organization = self.organization
if commit:
instance.save()
return instance
def create_contact(request, company_pk):
# ...
if request.method == 'POST':
company = Company.objects.get(pk=company_pk)
organization = company.organization
contact_form = RestrictedContactForm(company, organization, request.POST, request.FILES)
# ...
# ...

Answer 2

I've always done this using the form_valid method. In this case, in the form_valid method of the child form:
def form_valid(self, form):
form.instance.company = foo
form.instance.organisation = bar
return super().form_valid(form)
This populates the missing field, and then saves the form.