serializer can't resolve a one-to-many relation from the "foreign" side

[nikl@…]

best illustrated with a short example:

class Reporter(models.Model):
    name = models.CharField(maxlength=25)

class Article(models.Model):
    reporter = models.ForeignKey(Reporter)

what I want to be able to get is something like the following (python-serialization):

[{'fields': {'articles': [1, 2, 3],
             'name': 'Me'},
  'model': 'news.reporter',
  'pk': '1'}]

currently, if I want to get the information in this format, I have two options:

• construct a Model-like structure, so it can be used with the serializers
• turn the one-to-many into a many-to-many relationship

both of these are obviously not a clean solution...

therefore I'd propose to add an extra parameter to export the ids of those related-objects optionally.

if time allows and there are no objections to this, I'll try to throw together a patch this weekend.

["Nikolaus Schlemm" <nikl@…>]

no time on the weekend, but now it's done :)

one small change to what I previously wrote: using "article_set" instead of "articles" seemed much more consistent with the rest of the django api

["Nikolaus Schlemm" <nikl@…>]

now with the paths relative to django root-dir, not the serializers dir

[(none)]

Milestone Version 1.0 deleted

[Jacob]

This looks good to me, but needs a few changes:

• I'd like the option "export_o2m" to be changed to something more clear. How about "include_reverse_relations"?
• Tests need to be written for the new behavior.
• As does documentation, but since the serializers doc is not where close to finished and that's my fault, I'll check this in without docs if someone else can handle the first two items.

[Nikolaus Schlemm <nikl@…>]

just a quick option rename. unfortunately, I don't much more time right as I'm in the middle of starting a new job - plus moving from one city to another...

[Nikolaus Schlemm <nikl@…>]

argh! forgot django/core/serializers/python.py in the last diff...

[Aymeric Augustin]

Change UI/UX from NULL to False.

[Aymeric Augustin]

Change Easy pickings from NULL to False.

[c v t]

I see that there is now a ​GSOC proposal including this functionality, but that plan involves a completely new serialization interface. 5 years later, Nikolaus's patch applies to trunk with only minimal changes (attached) -- is there any chance that, once it has tests and documentation, this approach could make it into trunk if / in case the GSOC idea doesn't work out?

[Russell Keith-Magee]

I'm going to make an executive decision and close this as a wontfix.

This specific ticket is asking for a piecemeal addition to Django's serializers; the real underlying problem is that Django's serializers aren't as flexible as they need to be for real world problems. The example given in this ticket is one type of serialisation for which there are real use cases, but there are many others (e.g, depth > 1 serialization of relationships).

Once upon a time, I harboured dreams of writing a fully flexible serialisation framework for Django; luckily, that is no longer required, as Tom Christie has written a very robust and flexible set of serializers for Django REST Framework. If we want this in Django, we should maybe approach Tom to pull that piece of REST Framework into Django; but frankly, I'm not convinced this is worth the code churn (and it's one more thing that the core team doesn't have to worry about, which is a good thing).