Opened 10 years ago

Closed 9 years ago

#21680 closed Cleanup/optimization (fixed)

Stop supporting models in non-installed apps

Reported by: Aymeric Augustin Owned by: Aymeric Augustin <aymeric.augustin@…>
Component: Core (Other) Version: dev
Severity: Normal Keywords: app-loading 1.9
Cc: mmitar@… Triage Stage: Accepted
Has patch: yes Needs documentation: no
Needs tests: no Patch needs improvement: no
Easy pickings: no UI/UX: no

Description

The app registry is explicitly designed to support models outside installed applications.

This doesn't seem particularly useful and makes the code more complicated than necessary.

However, the consequences on backwards compatibility are hairy. If users simply add the missing apps to their INSTALLED_APPS settings, their project could start loading the wrong templates, static files, etc.

This change shouldn't be made lightly.

Change History (25)

comment:1 Changed 10 years ago by Mitar

Cc: mmitar@… added

comment:2 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

Triage Stage: UnreviewedAccepted

comment:3 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

The 1.7 release notes already warn against this.

comment:4 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

This could wreak havoc in Django's own tests, as some create arbitrary model classes.

A good middle ground could be to require that each model:

  • is in an installed application, or
  • has an explicit app label.

"Being in an installed application" means that the application has been registered in the app registry before the model class gets created. This is related to #21719.

comment:5 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

I'm going to implement a deprecation path for this.

comment:7 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin <aymeric.augustin@…>

In 3326a412ccde9f72e22a070a0b4d922048ed2286:

Deprecated importing a model before loading its application.

Refs #21719, #21680.

comment:8 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

Keywords: 1.9 added

This ticket cannot move forward until Django 1.9.

comment:9 Changed 10 years ago by loic84

While discussing #19774 on IRC it appeared that django.contrib.sites.models.get_current_site() which is imported in various places in Django would end up being an issue to anyone who doesn't have django.contrib.sites installed.

If we want to be ready for Django 1.9, we probably should start a deprecation period in 1.7 to move get_current_site() to the package __init__.py.

comment:10 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

Owner: changed from nobody to Aymeric Augustin
Severity: NormalRelease blocker
Status: newassigned

Good point.

comment:11 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

Has patch: set

comment:12 Changed 10 years ago by Carl Meyer

The PR for contrib.sites looks good.

It occurs to me that the ideal resolution for this ticket would be one where you could safely import models anytime, but they just wouldn't be available in the app registry or register themselves with the ORM (e.g. attach related managers to other models) until/unless their app were installed. (The general principle being that errors on import, or having to be careful what you import when, is an unfortunate smell due to reliance on import side effects.) I presume you considered this and decided it just wasn't feasible to implement? (I haven't looked at the relevant code in detail recently enough to know.)

comment:13 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

No, I didn't consider that. I don't know how complicated it would be. In general I would like to see if we can get away with the strict approach and avoid adding complexity to the app registry.

comment:14 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin <aymeric.augustin@…>

In 9ffab9cee1a5bd1a2f6c326ae970d92526f9a304:

Moved RequestSite and get_current_site.

Following the app-loading refactor, these objects must live outside of
django.contrib.sites.models because they must be available without
importing the django.contrib.sites.models module when
django.contrib.sites isn't installed.

Refs #21680. Thanks Carl and Loic for reporting this issue.

comment:15 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

Has patch: unset
Severity: Release blockerNormal

This is still open, but postponed until the deprecation completes.

comment:16 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

Owner: Aymeric Augustin deleted
Status: assignednew

comment:17 Changed 10 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

#22182 was a duplicate (with a long explanation).

comment:18 Changed 10 years ago by Mark Lavin

I've created a related ticket which notes that this deprecation exposes an issue with the defaults defined in global settings. See #22477.

comment:19 Changed 9 years ago by Tim Graham <timograham@…>

In 4548a282a1c64bb2ed414da3d08617d869cd3740:

Removed contrib.sites.models.RequestSite/get_current_site() aliases.

Per deprecation timeline; refs #21680.

comment:20 Changed 9 years ago by Tim Graham

Aymeric will look at this ticket and determine if there is there more to it than promoting the existing warning to an exception.

comment:21 Changed 9 years ago by Tim Graham

Also need to verify the documentation for Options.app_label in docs/ref/models/options.txt is accurate after this change.

comment:22 Changed 9 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

I filed #24312 so as not to lose the idea from comment 12.

comment:23 Changed 9 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

Patch needs improvement: set

Four tests in the test_runner app are failing.

comment:24 Changed 9 years ago by Aymeric Augustin

Has patch: set
Patch needs improvement: unset

comment:25 Changed 9 years ago by Aymeric Augustin <aymeric.augustin@…>

Owner: set to Aymeric Augustin <aymeric.augustin@…>
Resolution: fixed
Status: newclosed

In 1b8af4cfa023161924a45fb572399d2f3071bf5b:

Disallowed importing concrete models without an application.

Removed fragile algorithm to find which application a model belongs to.

Fixed #21680, #21719. Refs #21794.

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