Serving Static files - Django-nonrel in Appengine - django

Question

I've successfully got a basic Django-nonrel app up and running on Appengine. The templates are getting rendered properly, but the static content returns a 404 response.
There is no problem with the static content in the dev server launched using `python manage.py runserver'.
These are the relevant lines in static.py:
STATIC_URL = '/static/'
STATICFILES_FINDERS = (
'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.FileSystemFinder', # Refers to PROJECT_DIR/static
'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.AppDirectoriesFinder', # Appname/static
)
STATICFILES_DIRS = (os.path.join(PROJECT_DIR, 'static'),)
In the relevant template:
{% extends "base.html" %}
{% load staticfiles %}
{% block title %}Adding Objects{% endblock %}
{% block content %}
<p>Placeholder for Objects</p>
<img src="{% static "test_pattern.gif" %}">
<img src="{% static "sample_overlay.gif" %}">
{% endblock %}
With this, static files in myproject/static directory and myproject/myapp/static directory are being served successfully in the dev server (python manage.py runserver).
This is my app.yaml:
application: appname
version: 1
runtime: python27
api_version: 1
threadsafe: yes
builtins:
- remote_api: on
inbound_services:
- warmup
libraries:
- name: django
version: latest
handlers:
- url: /_ah/queue/deferred
script: djangoappengine.deferred.handler.application
login: admin
- url: /_ah/stats/.*
script: djangoappengine.appstats.application
- url: /media/admin
static_dir: django/contrib/admin/media
expiration: '0'
- url: /.*
script: djangoappengine.main.application
Any clue how to fix this? I don't want the Appengine web server to handle static files, I want to route everything through Django (at least for now). Hence a solution like this isn't really acceptable in my case.
EDIT: I can easily get around this with this in my app.yaml and serving all static files from projectdir/static.
- url: /static
static_dir: static
But this solution seems dirty, I'd like to leave it all to Django.

Answer 1

Your adding the /static mapping in app.yaml is the correct method. It is not "dirty".
Also, you are adding the django library in app.yaml. That is not correct. Django-nonrel uses its own branch of Django, which you should import as a directory with your app. Adding the django call to libraries in app.yaml means you are importing 2 versions of Django, which can cause strange errors. Delete the Django library call in app.yaml, and import the Django version that is included with nonrel.