id	summary	reporter	owner	description	type	status	component	version	severity	resolution	keywords	cc	stage	has_patch	needs_docs	needs_tests	needs_better_patch	easy	ui_ux
28029	Removal of ability to reverse by dotted path found to be very non-DRY	Henrik Levkowetz	nobody	"I've been using django for the site `datatracker.ietf.org` for about 10 years now, updating to new Django releases along the way.  I've almost always appreciated the features of each new release, but release 1.10 brought this feature removal: 
 * The ability to reverse() URLs using a dotted Python path is removed.
   (https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/1.10/releases/1.10/#features-removed-in-1-10)

The site (datatracker.ietf.org) has about 750 distinct URL patterns, and we've been very good at referencing URLs using `{% url %}` in our templates, and using `django.url.reverse()` in code.  Given that the dotted url names previously provided gave a consistent DRY way of referring to the URL belonging to a given view function, we used it extensively.

This means that in order to upgrade to 1.10 I was suddenly faced with the task of manually naming ~750 URL patterns with unique and meaningful names, and potentially updating many thousands of places using reverse URL lookup in code and templates, for no apparent benefit.

The ticket which removed reversal by dotted path, #22384, also removed the ability to refer to view functions by strings in `url()`.  To be clear: This ticket is not about that change.  I found that a bit inconvenient, and it seems to me that it increases the risk of import loops, but that change is '''not''' what I'm contesting here; it's only the removal of the built-in ability to reverse by dotted path that I find very non-DRY.

In the end I replaced `django.conf.urls.url()` with a wrapper that generated a dotted-url-path name based on the view function, which mostly restored the pre-1.10 functionality; but having to do that seems to me to be very contrary to the batteries-included approach we're proud of."	Uncategorized	closed	Core (URLs)	1.10	Normal	invalid		felisiak.mariusz@…	Unreviewed	0	0	0	0	0	0