JREAM / applicious

Python / Django Ideas

Applicious

The following project provides an excellent start for you to begin a Django project with a modern frontend build kit enabled. By using this project template, you will be able to jump directly into your application without worrying about the small details in setting things up. Out of the box, you'll have the following features enabled:

• Django 1.9.7: The latest stable version of Django
• User authentication, authorization, and management ready to go
• User profiles with support for an Avatar
• Smart environment specific configuration
• Testing with py.test and coverage testing with Python coverage
• SCSS for frontend efficiency
• Build script using Gulp
• Browser LiveReload for .js, .scss, and Django Template files
• Templates written in Bootstrap 3 with Crispy Forms support for forms

All of this is ready to go and will be loaded on your first runserver command.

####Use Project Template

With Django we can now use this template to build our skeleton project. We do so by running (NOTE: Change the project_name portion of the following command to your project name.):

django-admin.py startproject --template=https://github.com/codezeus/django-project-template/archive/master.zip --extension=py,gitignore,coveragerc,json,md,sh,js,example,ini --name=Makefile,postactivate project_name .

This will clone the repo and build the skeleton into the current working directory. Once cloned, you can run the Make script to finish the setup:

make init

##Development Notes

The following notes detail how we can work with this project.

###Running the Project

When working with this application, there is a frontend and backend which can interact with each other and allow a very smooth development experience. It's best to have two terminal buffers open at once. In our first terminal, we will want to run Django:

python manage.py runserver_plus

This will spawn the development server at 127.0.0.1:8000. Moving to the next terminal, we will want to run Gulp to watch our files:

gulp

The default Gulp task is to watch. This task will build the application with Browserify, Compile SASS files, Compile JS files, gather Third Party CSS and Fonts, listen for changes to SCSS, JavaScript, and Django Template files and create a proxy at 127.0.0.1:8001. Upon change, the server will reload with BrowserSync.

###Editing the Settings

In the case that you want to change settings, edit the frontend things, or customize it, the following guide will help.

####Django Settings

The Django settings are located in the applicious/settings/ directory. They inherit from one another with the final output being:

      -- Development --
     /                  \
Base ---  Production  --- Local
     \                  /
      --   Staging   --

The three centerpieces are interchangable based on the current environment you are working in. In most cases, you will edit an environment file. The local.py file will be for all secret variables as it is referenced in the .gitignore.

####Gulp Config

The Gulp master config is a JavaScript Object that lives in gulp/config.js. In here, we have a reference to all build paths which should all just work. All active development for the frontend should be done within the applicious/dev/ directory. If you want to add any third-party scripts, they should exist in the applicious/static/ directory and included in the base template file (applicious/templates.base.html).

###Gulp Tasks

The following Gulp tasks can all be run:

gulp                      - Will run watcher
gulp build                - Will build dependencies and run watchify
gulp build --production   - Will build dependencies and exit on finish
gulp browserify           - Will only run browserify
gulp javascript           - Will only compile JS files
gulp sass                 - Will only compile scss into css
gulp templates            - Will only reload browsersync
gulp watch                - Will run watcher

Typically, you should stick with only two commands: gulp and gulp build --production. These tasks will be most efficient.

##Running Tests

Tests are currently ready for Python code based on pytest and coverage. We are using Factory Boy for text fixtures. To run just the test suite:

py.test

In order to run the tests and get a coverage report:

make test

These two tasks will give you a detailed output of the Python code.

##Utility Scripts

A few utility scripts are provided via the Makefile. The following commands are available:

###Generate a 32-Character Secret String

This is good to use for a Secret key or other random hashes.

make secret