Ive been making a site in django and thinking about using some of the apps available online for things like wiki or forum. I was wondering what the drawbacks were. Are those apps likely to be less secure that using something like vbulletin or mediawiki instead?
In general is django pretty secure to begin with? I know almost nothing about security so I find myself wondering sometimes.
vBulletin and MediaWiki are pretty insecure apps. I think typical django app is much more secure than these two :-)
Django by default prevents many security mistakes (SQL injection, xss, csrf) so developer should make an effort to create insecure app.
For some reason i can't figure out, other than the 'stupid' errors that keep creeping up when I try to access media files (files uploaded by the user) in my Django app, why I just can't server media files!
In this particular case, all I want for example is to be able to serve up images to the front that have been uploaded. My up correctly serves static files via /static/, but when I try to serve my /site_media/ files hell breaks loose! What could I be doing wrong?
So, after realizing that Django wasn't essentially crafted to actually handle media files, I decided to resort to using Apache via the recommended mod_python option like it is recommended to do in production. But I've never done this before, and am wondering whether this is worth the trouble on the development server.
Well, I know eventually I have to go down this path when I go production, and so will still have to learn how to do this, but what are the pros and cons for this route on the development server?
First, mod_python is not recommended. In fact, it's specifically recommended against. Use mod_wsgi instead.
Secondly, we have no possible way of telling what you're doing wrong when serving static media via the dev server, because you have provided no code or details of your setup.
Finally, there is no reason why you can't use Apache - or even better, a lightweight server such as nginx - and point it at your static directory only. Then, set STATIC_URL in your settings.py to the address served by that server. It makes no difference what port it is on while you're in development.
It is surely a pro since the django serves the requests faster without having to deal with the media.
A con is that, if and when you edit the media, you need to also restart the apache, for the media to refresh.
update based on your comment:
You can of-course easily do it. One simple way I practice this is, by using the nginx and symlinking the media folder into nginx sites-enabled and run nginx on port 80 (or any other).
You can set the MEDIA_URL in your settings, where you point it to the url with the appropriate port.
I am completely new to this Django world. I haven't tried it ever before.
Now the problem is as below;
One of my clients was hosting his site somewhere else that I don't know and they built the site using Django. The host company doesn't allow to make any changes on their server, instead they provided the zip file for all the files in the site to me; so that now I can host my client's site.
As I don't know anything about Django, can someone please shed a light where I should start from?
Thanks in advance.
Cheers.
Sach
First of all, install Django on the development machine. Start by trying to get the development server run on your machine.
Gather requirements: check the settings.py for installed apps against the default Django settings.py file. See if there are any popular django apps that site depends on. If there are any, then you probably will have to install them, too.
In which format was the database provided? Will you move to another more appropriate format? Python bindings for databases are required too.
Considering the fact that you have inherited this project and probably will need to make some changes, consider installing django-south, so you can easily make changes to the database schema.
If you get the site running properly on your own machine, consider deplyoment. Is there a lot of static content? (if so, consider nginx). Set up apache2 and install the mod_wsgi module. Deploy.
Work your way through the Django tutorial first. Then look into Django Book as has been mentioned. Django IRC channel (#django) on Freenode is also great for help.
Your best bet would be to learn about Django before trying to jump in head first - https://www.djangoproject.com/ contains documentation as well as tutorials on creating Django apps.
Django is fairly easy to setup if you already have the code written. You'll need to install the chosen database and then simply follow the tutorial on the Django website
Django comes with a built-in server so it's very easy to run the website for development without needing Apache, nginx or much else.
I learned using the Django Book. Django is an easy-to-use framework, you should be fine.
Also, in the short-term there's a file called views.py and separate folder containing templates. If you're familiar with MVC (MVT in Django) this contains the views for the site in function form. There's probably (but not always) a folder for templates which contains a lot of the HTML for the site. Just a good starting pointing for basic modifications.
You can perhaps start here. https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/howto/deployment/
First, find out the django version required by your client. Install that on a server (not a production one), setup apache and mod_wsgi. The zip files may go to a dir which can be included in the mod_wsgi configuration.
Find about the static files and setup apache or any other lightweight webserver to server it.
You may not be a developer, but have a try with the django book. It can give you a good idea how its structured.
I was presenting a Django demonstration to my brother and he asked me the following question(s): "Why Django static and media folders aren't pre-configured? It's purpose aren't to be a convention over configuration framework? Why I am supposed to configure these things every time I start a Django project?"
I couldn't answer to him. Does anyone can?
P.S: I don't mean to compare Django with other frameworks. I'm just trying to understand why these design decisions were made;
Django is very definitely not a convention over configuration framework. Your brother is perhaps thinking of Rails, which does follow that principle - but Django follows the Python principle of "explicit is better than implicit".
Because django shouldn't distribute media files anyway. When you read the documentation you can see that the static files should (and must) be distributed by your server engine and/or by some kind of CDN when you are in production. Django, is just here to process your pages but not your media. And when you are in development, indeed, you have to use django to distribute static files. But you can use a python script to generate it, and manage it. For me, one of the best is: Django mediagenerator. This will let your files like they are in dev mode, but this will optimize it in production.
I've worked with XAMPP, WAMPP, MAMPP, etc and am starting to look at Django.
A majority of the work we do is very CMS orientated; although we've been told not to use third-party CMS' (mainly because of user's find them hard to use, and other issues), I've found that I can code a very simple CMS using Cake, CodeIgniter or one of the other PHP frameworks.
And yet, I'm getting increasingly frustrated with the amount of coding I need to do just to get something up and running, and I've been told that Django is a good Python framework to use. It also seems to get a lot of buzz from reddit.
I have some concerns and queries about moving from XAMPP to Django.
1) Security
Any web app should be coded defensively. Over the past few years we've seen a movement towards protecting against XSS, SQL injections, Cross site forgeries, session fixation, session hi-jacking, cookie hi-jacking; the amount of security one needs can be overwhelming.
What things does Django do to prevent/limit XSS, SQL injections, Javascript injections, and santizing input; one normally associates with securing PHP web apps? Is it something I need to worry about, or does Django do all this stuff out of the box.
2) What goes in the /www/ public folder?
In a manual I read it said not to put manage.py or the other .py stuff in the main webroot, so this means I put everything outside of the webroot; so what goes in there?
Do I put the /templates/ directory inside the webroot? How does the server know what to run?
3) Can I still use .htaccess on Django projects? I am familiar with Apache and often use it to do routing, or blocking off bad bots, but will using .htaccess still work?
4) Cronjobs
Do cronjobs still work with Python/Django projects?
5) Running Third party perl/other scripts
In PHP you can use other libraries such as the curl library, ffmpeg, ImageMagik as well as many others; can I still use these libraries with Python/Django?
6) Admin screen
Django gives you an out-of-the-box admin screen; is this only for development purposes or can it put live? I am concerned about any the security of the admin screen.
7) Integration with Discuss, Facebook, Twitter, OpenID, captcha, etc.
There are libraries in PHP that help integrate DisQuss, Facebook, Twitter; but is it relatively easy to do an integration with these and other third party apps?
8) E-commerce, SSL
Are there many e-commerce sites that use Django? I've seen a lot of CMS/Blog type software but not many e-commerce sites. By which I mean, shopping card, Protx/Paypal or Worldpay integration.
That's another thing; there are sandboxes for Protx, Paypal, Worldpay etc for PHP -- but are there any for Django?
9) Is it worth it?
Is it worth moving to Django from an XAMPP background? Will it really make things faster, or is that just marketing hype?
Thanks.
Security. The Django core team are very security-conscious, and have taken great care to make things like SQL injection impossible. The next version, 1.2, includes a whole new cross-site request forgery protection library. Obviously, you still need to be aware of these when developing your application, but Django does a lot to help you.
What goes under /www/public: Nothing. Django doesn't work via the normal Apache serving mechanism: it hooks into (preferably) mod_wsgi, which needs a single file which then tells it to run the rest of the code. The templates can go anywhere, and are pointed to by your Django settings file, but again aren't served directly by Apache.
.htaccess: You don't really need it, because of point 2: you're not serving things in a filesystem hierarchy. The best way to do it is to set up vhosts and manage things that way.
Cron jobs: Absolutely. Django is just Python, and you can easily run Python scripts via cron. Django allows you to set up custom command scripts which initialise the ORM and give you access to anything you would need.
Libraries: Again, because Django is Python, you get access to the huge amount of Python libraries that are out there. For curl, Python has urllib; for ImageMagick, it has PIL; and no doubt there are equivalents of ffmpeg too.
Admin: Again, security has been thought of from the beginning. Opinions differ as to whether you should use the admin only for your expert users, or customise it and allow access for all users; I've had a lot of success using it as the basis for my custom CMS interfaces.
Facebook, etc: Yes, there are libraries for all of these.
E-commerce: There is a whole e-commerce project, Satchmo, written in Django. Libraries exist to interface with all the payment providers.
Is it worth it? Only you can tell. My experience working alongside a range of developers who have moved from PHP is that they've enjoyed the experience and became much more productive.
On SQL Injections: Django uses an ORM, which takes care of SQL injection protection, and you will rarely write you own SQL. If you do, just follow the instructions on how to pass parameters to raw queries and prevent SQL Injections.
There is an entire chapter on the django book about security that should answer all your questions.
On what goes into /www/: anything that is not code? The concern is to not put the python code there.
On .htaccess: Yes, it should still work (for any non Django resources as Daniel points out).
On cronjobs: what do you mean?
On Libraries: Python - the language you will use with Django - is rich in libraries that probably provide the same functionality you are used to. This is a key point: you will need to learn Python well to benefit the most from Django.
On the admin interface: This is actually the thing that will probably help you the most, judging from your question. They are customizable (within some limits) and they really give the staff (it is not intended for public users, but for staff users) the basics of CRUD for your database models. It is a time saver. You might need to write your own templates for advanced functionality, but for most simple CRUD aimed at staff (which is usually the point of a CMS) it is very useful and easy to set up.
On integration: Check Pinax for a group of applications that provide extra functionality. There is a rich and diverse universe of integration solutions out there. It is not unusual to find questions here in SO about django + facebook and others.
On E-commerce: Check Satchmo out.
Is it worth it: Now, I have no experience with XAMPP. I know that I like Python better than both Perl and PHP (and Java, for that matter). I know that as a framework Django is simpler to use, faster to deploy than anything I used before.
My suggestion is the age old: go build a simple project and make up your own mind. You are the only one in position to decide if Django is the framework for you.
An older question on SO discusses some Django limitations. My answer to that might be helpful to you too.
I recently moved to developing any new projects in Django, coming from a PHP background. Here are my thoughts on your questions.
1) Security
Strings sent to templates is escaped by default, which takes care of most of that. Since you're using an ORM, SQL injection shouldn't be an issue unless you build raw queries for some reason.
2) What goes in the /www/ public folder?
Django doesn't use a file hierarchy for URLs like a typical PHP setup. The server knows what to run from your urls.py and settings.py pointer to the template folder.
3) Can I still use .htaccess on Django projects? I am familiar with Apache and often use it to do routing, or blocking off bad bots, but will using .htaccess still work?
As noted above, it works for static content just the same. For dynamic pages, you'd want to implement some other form of authentication or redirection for clients you want to block, as far as I know.
4) Cronjobs
There's no reason why you can't use cron for whatever, as you still have a normal Linux system.
5) Running Third party perl/other scripts
You'll want to use the Python versions of those libraries, of course. For instance
FFMpeg
PythonMagick
I replaced most of my need for Curl with the built-in urllib and urrlib2 libraries, but there is also PyCurl if you need it.
6) Admin screen
The Admin screen is intended to be used by your own admins, i.e. site staff. It may be possible to do so, but it's not supposed to be the scaffolding on which you build your public facing project.
7) Integration with Discuss, Facebook, Twitter, OpenID, captcha, etc.
There are a lot of people out there using Python and Django, and I haven't had any problem finding libraries. In my experience there is a bit less support for something than PHP, but what is there is often higher quality.
8) E-commerce, SSL
I haven't tried payment integration, so I can't say. Not sure about the other sites, but the Paypal Sandbox is run by Paypal, isn't it? I don't think it's related to what you're using on the server, so sure, you can access it like normal.
9) Is it worth it? Is it worth moving to Django from an XAMPP background? Will it really make things faster, or is that just marketing hype?
I moved to Django because Python is truly a more compelling language than PHP. Will it make things faster? I'm not sure what the advantages in that respect would be for Django vs.the PHP MVC frameworks. There are no magic bullets.
You do have to keep in mind that you're not just learning a new framework, but also a new language. There will be a bit of a learning curve if you've never used Python before. but I've found both Python and Django to be fairly easy to learn. The clean design of the language is fantastic and Django is veryt well designed, too. I do feel that it's boosting my productivity. I've found snippets for or articles about most everything I need to do in Django as I've been learning, so adapting has been pretty simple.