Automatic migrations prevent creation of initial database table layout

[SimonSteinberger]

Using an AbstractUser based user model with Django 1.8 RC1 causes the management command to create the table layout on a *new and empty database* to fail: python manage.py migrate

Traceback:
  File "manage.py", line 9, in <module>
    execute_from_command_line(sys.argv)
  File "...\site-packages\django\core\management\__init__.py", line 338, in execute_from_command_line
    utility.execute()
  File "...\site-packages\django\core\management\__init__.py", line 330, in execute
    self.fetch_command(subcommand).run_from_argv(self.argv)
  File "...\site-packages\django\core\management\base.py", line 390, in run_from_argv
    self.execute(*args, *\*cmd_options)
  File "...\site-packages\django\core\management\base.py", line 441, in execute
    output = self.handle(*args, *\*options)
  File "...\site-packages\django\core\management\commands\migrate.py", line 179, in handle
    created_models = self.sync_apps(connection, executor.loader.unmigrated_apps)
  File "...\site-packages\django\core\management\commands\migrate.py", line 317, in sync_apps
    cursor.execute(statement)
  File "...\site-packages\django\db\backends\utils.py", line 79, in execute
    return super(CursorDebugWrapper, self).execute(sql, params)
  File "...\site-packages\django\db\backends\utils.py", line 64, in execute
    return self.cursor.execute(sql, params)
  File "...\site-packages\django\db\utils.py", line 97, in __exit__
    six.reraise(dj_exc_type, dj_exc_value, traceback)
  File "...\site-packages\django\db\backends\utils.py", line 62, in execute
    return self.cursor.execute(sql)
django.db.utils.ProgrammingError: relation "auth_group" does not exist

What happens is that the django_migrations table gets created. Creation of all other tables are discarded/reverted due to this error.

If necessary, I may be able to provide a minimal code for reproducing this issue. It's happening in five independent projects for me. I hope I'm doing something wrong here, but it may just as well be a bug.

Possible solution is not to do any automatic migrations when creating a fresh database table layout.

[Tim Graham]

Yes, we will need some more details.

Do your apps have migrations? Are you mixing apps with migrations and apps without migrations?