Opened 11 years ago

Closed 11 years ago

Last modified 11 years ago

#19582 closed New feature (fixed)

Add tutorial on static files

Reported by: James Pic Owned by: Tim Graham
Component: Documentation Version: dev
Severity: Normal Keywords: docs, static files, sprint2013
Cc: James Pic, reinout@… Triage Stage: Accepted
Has patch: yes Needs documentation: no
Needs tests: no Patch needs improvement: yes
Easy pickings: yes UI/UX: no

Description

Maybe it's just me, but I've seen so many users confused by how django static files work.

Users trying to stuff their project-specific staticfiles into STATIC_ROOT for example, instead of adding a path in STATICFILES_DIRS.

A tutorial for static files could help many users.

Attachments (2)

proposal_1.rst (2.0 KB ) - added by James Pic 11 years ago.
Proposal for the tutorial06, based on Jannis suggestion to kind of follow the structure of the tutorial about templates (project-specific override first, app templates next)
proposal_0.rst (1.6 KB ) - added by James Pic 11 years ago.
Proposal for tutorial06 about staticfiles: with smaller steps but not following the exact same pedagogy used to teach template file management

Download all attachments as: .zip

Change History (26)

comment:1 by anonymous, 11 years ago

Easy pickings: set
Keywords: docs static files added
Needs documentation: set
Triage Stage: UnreviewedAccepted
Type: UncategorizedCleanup/optimization
Version: 1.4master

It's not just you. :)

Django docs contain two pages about static files:
https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/howto/static-files/
https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/ref/contrib/staticfiles/

The first one is hard to understand but does the job and acts as a kind of tutorial. In my opinion, we could re-write this information but make it more easy to understand.

If you are willing to make a contribution to Django, you are welcome to do so and apply a patch. I'll set easy pickings.

comment:2 by Russell Keith-Magee, 11 years ago

Zed Shaw has provided a detailed teardown/rant on what is wrong with the current docs, and how to improve them. Summarizing, It looks like the confusion stems from three sources:

  • Understanding what staticfiles is actually trying to do
  • Ordering of information - the howto talks about production needs before development needs
  • Clarity over the role played by various settings.

comment:3 by alecperkins@…, 11 years ago

I took a stab at rewriting the first part of the static files howto (rendered). This was based on, for the first time in literally years, trying to set up static files from scratch and finally wrapping my head around it.

For those coming at staticfiles with the expectation of "put files in this folder, they get served at this URL", the app-specific static files idea is confusing. This rewrite makes it more clear what's necessary to get that outcome, and explain why the process is the way it is.

comment:4 by Tim Graham, 11 years ago

Has patch: set
Needs documentation: unset

comment:5 by James Pic, 11 years ago

Cc: James Pic added
Last edited 11 years ago by James Pic (previous) (diff)

comment:6 by Reinout van Rees, 11 years ago

Cc: reinout@… added

comment:7 by Jannis Leidel, 11 years ago

A quick discussion about staticfiles from Zed Shaw: https://twitter.com/jezdez/statuses/291608100564242432

comment:8 by Reinout van Rees, 11 years ago

Owner: changed from nobody to Reinout van Rees
Status: newassigned

Note: we're sprinting on this in Utrecht at the "Dutch winter sprint" 23/24 feb 2013.

comment:9 by Reinout van Rees, 11 years ago

Keywords: sprint2013 added

by James Pic, 11 years ago

Attachment: proposal_1.rst added

Proposal for the tutorial06, based on Jannis suggestion to kind of follow the structure of the tutorial about templates (project-specific override first, app templates next)

by James Pic, 11 years ago

Attachment: proposal_0.rst added

Proposal for tutorial06 about staticfiles: with smaller steps but not following the exact same pedagogy used to teach template file management

comment:10 by James Pic, 11 years ago

On which structure should we base tutorial06 about staticfiles ? proposal_1.rst or proposal_0.rst ?

comment:11 by Jannis Leidel, 11 years ago

Proposal 0, as it introduces app level static files earlier. I just talked with Aymeric about it and we decided it would be best to move more toward pushing the idea of apps in the tutorial in general, including the part where we point to TEMPLATES_DIRS. This would be another ticket entirely of course.

comment:12 by Wim Feijen, 11 years ago

We splitted this ticket:

Rewriting the how-to is now done in:

https://code.djangoproject.com/ticket/19897

comment:13 by James Pic, 11 years ago

After talking with Aymeric, we decided the following plan for tutorial06:

  • Using the AppDirectoriesFinder: demonstrates how to use polls/static/polls/style.css with {% static 'polls/style.css' %},
  • Relating static files: a simple demonstration of adding a css background image, just to have an opportunity of warning the user that he should not hardcode absolute paths.

comment:15 by Wim Feijen, 11 years ago

Triage Stage: AcceptedReady for checkin

comment:16 by Wim Feijen, 11 years ago

Well written!

comment:17 by Tim Graham, 11 years ago

Patch needs improvement: set
Triage Stage: Ready for checkinAccepted

This isn't quite RFC, I've left some comments on the pull request.

comment:18 by Aymeric Augustin, 11 years ago

This should be merged simultaneously with #19897 as some bits are moved from the howto to this new tutorial.

comment:19 by Tim Graham, 11 years ago

Owner: changed from Reinout van Rees to Tim Graham

I'm reviewing this and will merge it when finished.

comment:20 by Reinout van Rees, 11 years ago

If you want me (or probably jpic) to do some squish-commits-together work or something like that, just say so :-)

comment:22 by Aymeric Augustin, 11 years ago

Type: Cleanup/optimizationNew feature

comment:23 by Tim Graham <timograham@…>, 11 years ago

Resolution: fixed
Status: assignedclosed

In c32fc79aa120a0a129680805aef6731c1c2c7aef:

Fixed #19582 - Added a static files tutorial.

Thanks James Pic.

comment:24 by Tim Graham <timograham@…>, 11 years ago

In 1c42a3ec736f55b79bc1a7b4cad4cbe65b9cb27e:

[1.5.X] Fixed #19582 - Added a static files tutorial.

Thanks James Pic.

Backport of c32fc79aa1 from master

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