permit values_list flat with more than one key

[rm_]

As far as i understand the limitation of flat with just one attribute looks arbitrary [1] likely to prevent one to shoot himself in the foot getting data of different types / or different meaning. But when you have a model with a ForeignKey to itself that is handy. Some popular application like django-mptt use this kind of models.
If the change is sound, I think i can have a try at doing a patch, should one add a force_flat flag or just remove the limitation and update documentation?

[1] ​https://github.com/django/django/blob/master/django/db/models/query.py#L542

[Shai Berger]

So if you have, say, a model with just id and a self-referencing FK, and records that look like

id	parent_id
1	NULL
2	1
3	1
4	2

you want to be able to say

vals = MyModel.objects.all().values_list('id', 'parent_id', flat=True)

and get

vals == [1, None, 2, 1, 3, 1, 4, 2]

instead of the current

vals = MyModel.objects.all().values_list('id', 'parent_id')
vals == [(1, None), (2, 1), (3, 1), (4, 2)]

I'd be -0 at best. The current flat=True is a shortcut for a very common use case. This isn't, and getting it right is a little more complicated than removing the limitation at the API.

I'm closing this on needsinfo, so you may reopen if you have a more convincing explanation of the feature and its usefulness.