Django choice field populated by queryset - save id but show value - django

Question

I have two models, Tag and TagGroup.
class TagGroup(models.Model):
tag_group_name = models.CharField(max_length=100)
class Tag(models.Model):
tag_name = models.CharField(max_length=100)
tag_group = models.ForeignKey(TagGroup, blank=True, null=True)
I've put a TagGroup form as a choice field into a template so that I can assign a TagGroup to a Tag. I created this form to populate from a TagGroup queryset.
class TagGroupForm(ModelForm):
tag_group_name = forms.ModelChoiceField(queryset=TagGroup.objects.values_list('id', 'tag_group_name'), required=False)
class Meta:
model = TagGroup
fields = [
'tag_group_name'
]
I haven't seen any obvious instructions how I can assign the Id to the Tag table while showing the user only the Tag value in the choice field in the template.
Currently the above shows:
Couple of questions:
is the queryset correct? I have tried without "values_list" but it then just shows an "Object" in the form field in template?
how do i 'hide' the Id so i can save on it, while only showing the user the actual string value in the form field?
Edited to add updated form:
class TagGroupForm(ModelForm):
tag_group_name = forms.ModelChoiceField(queryset=TagGroup.objects.all(), to_field_name = 'tag_group_name', required=False)
class Meta:
model = TagGroup
fields = [
'tag_group_name'
]
this now produces the following .. looks close .. the form value has a nice string but the actual value displayed to user is still "TagGroup object". How to get this to show?

Answer 1

From the docs,
The str (unicode on Python 2) method of the model will be called to generate string representations of the objects for use
So simply just assign this to the objects name and all will be ok! (Also, you don't need to use values_list) The reason it shows the Object by default is because this is what the default string representation is.
class TagGroup(models.Model):
tag_group_name = models.CharField(max_length=100)
def __str__(self):
return self.tag_group_name
tag_group_name = forms.ModelChoiceField(queryset=TagGroup.objects.all(), required=False)
Alternatively, if you don't wish to modify this and wish to reserve it for other uses.
To provide customized representations, subclass ModelChoiceField and override label_from_instance. This method will receive a model object, and should return a string suitable for representing it
class TagChoiceField(ModelChoiceField):
queryset = TagGroup.objects.all()
def label_from_instance(self, obj):
return obj.tag_group_name # or similar