| =================================== |
| Using mixins with class-based views |
| =================================== |
|
|
| .. caution:: |
|
|
| This is an advanced topic. A working knowledge of :doc:`Django's |
| class-based views<index>` is advised before exploring these |
| techniques. |
|
|
| Django's built-in class-based views provide a lot of functionality, |
| but some of it you may want to use separately. For instance, you may |
| want to write a view that renders a template to make the HTTP |
| response, but you can't use |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateView`; perhaps you need to |
| render a template only on ``POST``, with ``GET`` doing something else |
| entirely. While you could use |
| :class:`~django.template.response.TemplateResponse` directly, this |
| will likely result in duplicate code. |
|
|
| For this reason, Django also provides a number of mixins that provide |
| more discrete functionality. Template rendering, for instance, is |
| encapsulated in the |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin`. The Django |
| reference documentation contains :doc:`full documentation of all the |
| mixins</ref/class-based-views/mixins>`. |
|
|
| Context and template responses |
| ============================== |
|
|
| Two central mixins are provided that help in providing a consistent |
| interface to working with templates in class-based views. |
|
|
| :class:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin` |
| Every built in view which returns a |
| :class:`~django.template.response.TemplateResponse` will call the |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin.render_to_response()` |
| method that ``TemplateResponseMixin`` provides. Most of the time this |
| will be called for you (for instance, it is called by the ``get()`` method |
| implemented by both :class:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateView` and |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.DetailView`); similarly, it's unlikely |
| that you'll need to override it, although if you want your response to |
| return something not rendered via a Django template then you'll want to do |
| it. For an example of this, see the :ref:`JSONResponseMixin example |
| <jsonresponsemixin-example>`. |
|
|
| ``render_to_response()`` itself calls |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin.get_template_names`, |
| which by default will look up |
| :attr:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin.template_name` on |
| the class-based view; two other mixins |
| (:class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectTemplateResponseMixin` |
| and |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectTemplateResponseMixin`) |
| override this to provide more flexible defaults when dealing with actual |
| objects. |
|
|
| :class:`~django.views.generic.base.ContextMixin` |
| Every built in view which needs context data, such as for rendering a |
| template (including ``TemplateResponseMixin`` above), should call |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.base.ContextMixin.get_context_data()` passing |
| any data they want to ensure is in there as keyword arguments. |
| ``get_context_data()`` returns a dictionary; in ``ContextMixin`` it |
| returns its keyword arguments, but it is common to override this to add |
| more members to the dictionary. You can also use the |
| :attr:`~django.views.generic.base.ContextMixin.extra_context` attribute. |
|
|
| Building up Django's generic class-based views |
| ============================================== |
|
|
| Let's look at how two of Django's generic class-based views are built |
| out of mixins providing discrete functionality. We'll consider |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.DetailView`, which renders a |
| "detail" view of an object, and |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.list.ListView`, which will render a list |
| of objects, typically from a queryset, and optionally paginate |
| them. This will introduce us to four mixins which between them provide |
| useful functionality when working with either a single Django object, |
| or multiple objects. |
|
|
| There are also mixins involved in the generic edit views |
| (:class:`~django.views.generic.edit.FormView`, and the model-specific |
| views :class:`~django.views.generic.edit.CreateView`, |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.edit.UpdateView` and |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.edit.DeleteView`), and in the |
| date-based generic views. These are |
| covered in the :doc:`mixin reference |
| documentation</ref/class-based-views/mixins>`. |
|
|
| ``DetailView``: working with a single Django object |
| --------------------------------------------------- |
|
|
| To show the detail of an object, we basically need to do two things: |
| we need to look up the object and then we need to make a |
| :class:`~django.template.response.TemplateResponse` with a suitable template, |
| and that object as context. |
|
|
| To get the object, :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.DetailView` |
| relies on :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin`, |
| which provides a |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin.get_object` |
| method that figures out the object based on the URL of the request (it |
| looks for ``pk`` and ``slug`` keyword arguments as declared in the |
| URLConf, and looks the object up either from the |
| :attr:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin.model` attribute |
| on the view, or the |
| :attr:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin.queryset` |
| attribute if that's provided). ``SingleObjectMixin`` also overrides |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.base.ContextMixin.get_context_data()`, |
| which is used across all Django's built in class-based views to supply |
| context data for template renders. |
|
|
| To then make a :class:`~django.template.response.TemplateResponse`, |
| :class:`DetailView` uses |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectTemplateResponseMixin`, |
| which extends :class:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin`, |
| overriding |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin.get_template_names()` |
| as discussed above. It actually provides a fairly sophisticated set of options, |
| but the main one that most people are going to use is |
| ``<app_label>/<model_name>_detail.html``. The ``_detail`` part can be changed |
| by setting |
| :attr:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectTemplateResponseMixin.template_name_suffix` |
| on a subclass to something else. (For instance, the :doc:`generic edit |
| views<generic-editing>` use ``_form`` for create and update views, and |
| ``_confirm_delete`` for delete views.) |
|
|
| ``ListView``: working with many Django objects |
| ---------------------------------------------- |
|
|
| Lists of objects follow roughly the same pattern: we need a (possibly |
| paginated) list of objects, typically a |
| :class:`~django.db.models.query.QuerySet`, and then we need to make a |
| :class:`~django.template.response.TemplateResponse` with a suitable template |
| using that list of objects. |
|
|
| To get the objects, :class:`~django.views.generic.list.ListView` uses |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectMixin`, which |
| provides both |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectMixin.get_queryset` |
| and |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectMixin.paginate_queryset`. Unlike |
| with :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin`, there's no need |
| to key off parts of the URL to figure out the queryset to work with, so the |
| default uses the |
| :attr:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectMixin.queryset` or |
| :attr:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectMixin.model` attribute |
| on the view class. A common reason to override |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectMixin.get_queryset` |
| here would be to dynamically vary the objects, such as depending on |
| the current user or to exclude posts in the future for a blog. |
|
|
| :class:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectMixin` also overrides |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.base.ContextMixin.get_context_data()` to |
| include appropriate context variables for pagination (providing |
| dummies if pagination is disabled). It relies on ``object_list`` being |
| passed in as a keyword argument, which :class:`ListView` arranges for |
| it. |
|
|
| To make a :class:`~django.template.response.TemplateResponse`, |
| :class:`ListView` then uses |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectTemplateResponseMixin`; |
| as with :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectTemplateResponseMixin` |
| above, this overrides ``get_template_names()`` to provide :meth:`a range of |
| options <django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectTemplateResponseMixin>`, |
| with the most commonly-used being |
| ``<app_label>/<model_name>_list.html``, with the ``_list`` part again |
| being taken from the |
| :attr:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectTemplateResponseMixin.template_name_suffix` |
| attribute. (The date based generic views use suffixes such as ``_archive``, |
| ``_archive_year`` and so on to use different templates for the various |
| specialized date-based list views.) |
|
|
| Using Django's class-based view mixins |
| ====================================== |
|
|
| Now we've seen how Django's generic class-based views use the provided mixins, |
| let's look at other ways we can combine them. We're still going to be combining |
| them with either built-in class-based views, or other generic class-based |
| views, but there are a range of rarer problems you can solve than are provided |
| for by Django out of the box. |
|
|
| .. warning:: |
|
|
| Not all mixins can be used together, and not all generic class |
| based views can be used with all other mixins. Here we present a |
| few examples that do work; if you want to bring together other |
| functionality then you'll have to consider interactions between |
| attributes and methods that overlap between the different classes |
| you're using, and how `method resolution order`_ will affect which |
| versions of the methods will be called in what order. |
|
|
| The reference documentation for Django's :doc:`class-based |
| views</ref/class-based-views/index>` and :doc:`class-based view |
| mixins</ref/class-based-views/mixins>` will help you in |
| understanding which attributes and methods are likely to cause |
| conflict between different classes and mixins. |
|
|
| If in doubt, it's often better to back off and base your work on |
| :class:`View` or :class:`TemplateView`, perhaps with |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin` and |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectMixin`. Although you |
| will probably end up writing more code, it is more likely to be clearly |
| understandable to someone else coming to it later, and with fewer |
| interactions to worry about you will save yourself some thinking. (Of |
| course, you can always dip into Django's implementation of the generic |
| class-based views for inspiration on how to tackle problems.) |
|
|
| .. _method resolution order: https://www.python.org/download/releases/2.3/mro/ |
|
|
| Using ``SingleObjectMixin`` with View |
| ------------------------------------- |
|
|
| If we want to write a class-based view that responds only to ``POST``, we'll |
| subclass :class:`~django.views.generic.base.View` and write a ``post()`` method |
| in the subclass. However if we want our processing to work on a particular |
| object, identified from the URL, we'll want the functionality provided by |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin`. |
|
|
| We'll demonstrate this with the ``Author`` model we used in the |
| :doc:`generic class-based views introduction<generic-display>`. |
|
|
| .. code-block:: python |
| :caption: ``views.py`` |
|
|
| from django.http import HttpResponseForbidden, HttpResponseRedirect |
| from django.urls import reverse |
| from django.views import View |
| from django.views.generic.detail import SingleObjectMixin |
| from books.models import Author |
|
|
|
|
| class RecordInterestView(SingleObjectMixin, View): |
| """Records the current user's interest in an author.""" |
|
|
| model = Author |
|
|
| def post(self, request, *args, **kwargs): |
| if not request.user.is_authenticated: |
| return HttpResponseForbidden() |
|
|
| # Look up the author we're interested in. |
| self.object = self.get_object() |
| # Actually record interest somehow here! |
|
|
| return HttpResponseRedirect( |
| reverse("author-detail", kwargs={"pk": self.object.pk}) |
| ) |
|
|
| In practice you'd probably want to record the interest in a key-value |
| store rather than in a relational database, so we've left that bit |
| out. The only bit of the view that needs to worry about using |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin` is where we want to |
| look up the author we're interested in, which it does with a call to |
| ``self.get_object()``. Everything else is taken care of for us by the mixin. |
|
|
| We can hook this into our URLs easily enough: |
|
|
| .. code-block:: python |
| :caption: ``urls.py`` |
|
|
| from django.urls import path |
| from books.views import RecordInterestView |
|
|
| urlpatterns = [ |
| # ... |
| path( |
| "author/<int:pk>/interest/", |
| RecordInterestView.as_view(), |
| name="author-interest", |
| ), |
| ] |
|
|
| Note the ``pk`` named group, which |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin.get_object` uses |
| to look up the ``Author`` instance. You could also use a slug, or |
| any of the other features of |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin`. |
|
|
| Using ``SingleObjectMixin`` with ``ListView`` |
| --------------------------------------------- |
|
|
| :class:`~django.views.generic.list.ListView` provides built-in |
| pagination, but you might want to paginate a list of objects that are |
| all linked (by a foreign key) to another object. In our publishing |
| example, you might want to paginate through all the books by a |
| particular publisher. |
|
|
| One way to do this is to combine :class:`ListView` with |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin`, so that the queryset |
| for the paginated list of books can hang off the publisher found as the single |
| object. In order to do this, we need to have two different querysets: |
|
|
| ``Book`` queryset for use by :class:`~django.views.generic.list.ListView` |
| Since we have access to the ``Publisher`` whose books we want to list, we |
| override ``get_queryset()`` and use the ``Publisher``’s :ref:`reverse |
| foreign key manager<backwards-related-objects>`. |
|
|
| ``Publisher`` queryset for use in :meth:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin.get_object()` |
| We'll rely on the default implementation of ``get_object()`` to fetch the |
| correct ``Publisher`` object. |
| However, we need to explicitly pass a ``queryset`` argument because |
| otherwise the default implementation of ``get_object()`` would call |
| ``get_queryset()`` which we have overridden to return ``Book`` objects |
| instead of ``Publisher`` ones. |
|
|
| .. note:: |
|
|
| We have to think carefully about ``get_context_data()``. |
| Since both :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin` and |
| :class:`ListView` will |
| put things in the context data under the value of |
| ``context_object_name`` if it's set, we'll instead explicitly |
| ensure the ``Publisher`` is in the context data. :class:`ListView` |
| will add in the suitable ``page_obj`` and ``paginator`` for us |
| providing we remember to call ``super()``. |
|
|
| Now we can write a new ``PublisherDetailView``:: |
|
|
| from django.views.generic import ListView |
| from django.views.generic.detail import SingleObjectMixin |
| from books.models import Publisher |
|
|
|
|
| class PublisherDetailView(SingleObjectMixin, ListView): |
| paginate_by = 2 |
| template_name = "books/publisher_detail.html" |
|
|
| def get(self, request, *args, **kwargs): |
| self.object = self.get_object(queryset=Publisher.objects.all()) |
| return super().get(request, *args, **kwargs) |
|
|
| def get_context_data(self, **kwargs): |
| context = super().get_context_data(**kwargs) |
| context["publisher"] = self.object |
| return context |
|
|
| def get_queryset(self): |
| return self.object.book_set.all() |
|
|
| Notice how we set ``self.object`` within ``get()`` so we |
| can use it again later in ``get_context_data()`` and ``get_queryset()``. |
| If you don't set ``template_name``, the template will default to the normal |
| :class:`ListView` choice, which in this case would be |
| ``"books/book_list.html"`` because it's a list of books; |
| :class:`ListView` knows nothing about |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin`, so it doesn't have |
| any clue this view is anything to do with a ``Publisher``. |
|
|
| The ``paginate_by`` is deliberately small in the example so you don't |
| have to create lots of books to see the pagination working! Here's the |
| template you'd want to use: |
|
|
| .. code-block:: html+django |
|
|
| {% extends "base.html" %} |
|
|
| {% block content %} |
| <h2>Publisher {{ publisher.name }}</h2> |
|
|
| <ol> |
| {% for book in page_obj %} |
| <li>{{ book.title }}</li> |
| {% endfor %} |
| </ol> |
|
|
| <div class="pagination"> |
| <span class="step-links"> |
| {% if page_obj.has_previous %} |
| <a href="?page={{ page_obj.previous_page_number }}">previous</a> |
| {% endif %} |
|
|
| <span class="current"> |
| Page {{ page_obj.number }} of {{ paginator.num_pages }}. |
| </span> |
|
|
| {% if page_obj.has_next %} |
| <a href="?page={{ page_obj.next_page_number }}">next</a> |
| {% endif %} |
| </span> |
| </div> |
| {% endblock %} |
|
|
| Avoid anything more complex |
| =========================== |
|
|
| Generally you can use |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin` and |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin` when you need |
| their functionality. As shown above, with a bit of care you can even |
| combine ``SingleObjectMixin`` with |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.list.ListView`. However things get |
| increasingly complex as you try to do so, and a good rule of thumb is: |
|
|
| .. hint:: |
|
|
| Each of your views should use only mixins or views from one of the |
| groups of generic class-based views: :doc:`detail, |
| list<generic-display>`, :doc:`editing<generic-editing>` and |
| date. For example it's fine to combine |
| :class:`TemplateView` (built in view) with |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.list.MultipleObjectMixin` (generic list), but |
| you're likely to have problems combining ``SingleObjectMixin`` (generic |
| detail) with ``MultipleObjectMixin`` (generic list). |
|
|
| To show what happens when you try to get more sophisticated, we show |
| an example that sacrifices readability and maintainability when there |
| is a simpler solution. First, let's look at a naive attempt to combine |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.DetailView` with |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.edit.FormMixin` to enable us to |
| ``POST`` a Django :class:`~django.forms.Form` to the same URL as we're |
| displaying an object using :class:`DetailView`. |
|
|
| Using ``FormMixin`` with ``DetailView`` |
| --------------------------------------- |
|
|
| Think back to our earlier example of using :class:`View` and |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin` together. We were |
| recording a user's interest in a particular author; say now that we want to |
| let them leave a message saying why they like them. Again, let's assume we're |
| not going to store this in a relational database but instead in |
| something more esoteric that we won't worry about here. |
|
|
| At this point it's natural to reach for a :class:`~django.forms.Form` to |
| encapsulate the information sent from the user's browser to Django. Say also |
| that we're heavily invested in `REST`_, so we want to use the same URL for |
| displaying the author as for capturing the message from the |
| user. Let's rewrite our ``AuthorDetailView`` to do that. |
|
|
| .. _REST: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representational_state_transfer |
|
|
| We'll keep the ``GET`` handling from :class:`DetailView`, although |
| we'll have to add a :class:`~django.forms.Form` into the context data so we can |
| render it in the template. We'll also want to pull in form processing |
| from :class:`~django.views.generic.edit.FormMixin`, and write a bit of |
| code so that on ``POST`` the form gets called appropriately. |
|
|
| .. note:: |
|
|
| We use :class:`~django.views.generic.edit.FormMixin` and implement |
| ``post()`` ourselves rather than try to mix :class:`DetailView` with |
| :class:`FormView` (which provides a suitable ``post()`` already) because |
| both of the views implement ``get()``, and things would get much more |
| confusing. |
|
|
| Our new ``AuthorDetailView`` looks like this:: |
|
|
| # CAUTION: you almost certainly do not want to do this. |
| # It is provided as part of a discussion of problems you can |
| # run into when combining different generic class-based view |
| # functionality that is not designed to be used together. |
|
|
| from django import forms |
| from django.http import HttpResponseForbidden |
| from django.urls import reverse |
| from django.views.generic import DetailView |
| from django.views.generic.edit import FormMixin |
| from books.models import Author |
|
|
|
|
| class AuthorInterestForm(forms.Form): |
| message = forms.CharField() |
|
|
|
|
| class AuthorDetailView(FormMixin, DetailView): |
| model = Author |
| form_class = AuthorInterestForm |
|
|
| def get_success_url(self): |
| return reverse("author-detail", kwargs={"pk": self.object.pk}) |
|
|
| def post(self, request, *args, **kwargs): |
| if not request.user.is_authenticated: |
| return HttpResponseForbidden() |
| self.object = self.get_object() |
| form = self.get_form() |
| if form.is_valid(): |
| return self.form_valid(form) |
| else: |
| return self.form_invalid(form) |
|
|
| def form_valid(self, form): |
| # Here, we would record the user's interest using the message |
| # passed in form.cleaned_data['message'] |
| return super().form_valid(form) |
|
|
| ``get_success_url()`` provides somewhere to redirect to, which gets used |
| in the default implementation of ``form_valid()``. We have to provide our |
| own ``post()`` as noted earlier. |
|
|
| A better solution |
| ----------------- |
|
|
| The number of subtle interactions between |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.edit.FormMixin` and :class:`DetailView` is |
| already testing our ability to manage things. It's unlikely you'd want to |
| write this kind of class yourself. |
|
|
| In this case, you could write the ``post()`` method yourself, keeping |
| :class:`DetailView` as the only generic functionality, although writing |
| :class:`~django.forms.Form` handling code involves a lot of duplication. |
|
|
| Alternatively, it would still be less work than the above approach to |
| have a separate view for processing the form, which could use |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.edit.FormView` distinct from |
| :class:`DetailView` without concerns. |
|
|
| An alternative better solution |
| ------------------------------ |
|
|
| What we're really trying to do here is to use two different class |
| based views from the same URL. So why not do just that? We have a very |
| clear division here: ``GET`` requests should get the |
| :class:`DetailView` (with the :class:`~django.forms.Form` added to the context |
| data), and ``POST`` requests should get the :class:`FormView`. Let's |
| set up those views first. |
|
|
| The ``AuthorDetailView`` view is almost the same as :ref:`when we |
| first introduced AuthorDetailView<generic-views-extra-work>`; we have to |
| write our own ``get_context_data()`` to make the |
| ``AuthorInterestForm`` available to the template. We'll skip the |
| ``get_object()`` override from before for clarity:: |
|
|
| from django import forms |
| from django.views.generic import DetailView |
| from books.models import Author |
|
|
|
|
| class AuthorInterestForm(forms.Form): |
| message = forms.CharField() |
|
|
|
|
| class AuthorDetailView(DetailView): |
| model = Author |
|
|
| def get_context_data(self, **kwargs): |
| context = super().get_context_data(**kwargs) |
| context["form"] = AuthorInterestForm() |
| return context |
|
|
| Then the ``AuthorInterestFormView`` is a :class:`FormView`, but we have to |
| bring in :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectMixin` so we can find |
| the author we're talking about, and we have to remember to set |
| ``template_name`` to ensure that form errors will render the same template as |
| ``AuthorDetailView`` is using on ``GET``:: |
|
|
| from django.http import HttpResponseForbidden |
| from django.urls import reverse |
| from django.views.generic import FormView |
| from django.views.generic.detail import SingleObjectMixin |
|
|
|
|
| class AuthorInterestFormView(SingleObjectMixin, FormView): |
| template_name = "books/author_detail.html" |
| form_class = AuthorInterestForm |
| model = Author |
|
|
| def post(self, request, *args, **kwargs): |
| if not request.user.is_authenticated: |
| return HttpResponseForbidden() |
| self.object = self.get_object() |
| return super().post(request, *args, **kwargs) |
|
|
| def get_success_url(self): |
| return reverse("author-detail", kwargs={"pk": self.object.pk}) |
|
|
| Finally we bring this together in a new ``AuthorView`` view. We |
| already know that calling :meth:`~django.views.generic.base.View.as_view()` on |
| a class-based view gives us something that behaves exactly like a function |
| based view, so we can do that at the point we choose between the two subviews. |
|
|
| You can pass through keyword arguments to |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.base.View.as_view()` in the same way you |
| would in your URLconf, such as if you wanted the ``AuthorInterestFormView`` |
| behavior to also appear at another URL but using a different template:: |
|
|
| from django.views import View |
|
|
|
|
| class AuthorView(View): |
| def get(self, request, *args, **kwargs): |
| view = AuthorDetailView.as_view() |
| return view(request, *args, **kwargs) |
|
|
| def post(self, request, *args, **kwargs): |
| view = AuthorInterestFormView.as_view() |
| return view(request, *args, **kwargs) |
|
|
| This approach can also be used with any other generic class-based |
| views or your own class-based views inheriting directly from |
| :class:`View` or :class:`TemplateView`, as it keeps the different |
| views as separate as possible. |
|
|
| .. _jsonresponsemixin-example: |
|
|
| More than just HTML |
| =================== |
|
|
| Where class-based views shine is when you want to do the same thing many times. |
| Suppose you're writing an API, and every view should return JSON instead of |
| rendered HTML. |
|
|
| We can create a mixin class to use in all of our views, handling the |
| conversion to JSON once. |
|
|
| For example, a JSON mixin might look something like this:: |
|
|
| from django.http import JsonResponse |
|
|
|
|
| class JSONResponseMixin: |
| """ |
| A mixin that can be used to render a JSON response. |
| """ |
|
|
| def render_to_json_response(self, context, **response_kwargs): |
| """ |
| Returns a JSON response, transforming 'context' to make the payload. |
| """ |
| return JsonResponse(self.get_data(context), **response_kwargs) |
|
|
| def get_data(self, context): |
| """ |
| Returns an object that will be serialized as JSON by json.dumps(). |
| """ |
| # Note: This is *EXTREMELY* naive; in reality, you'll need |
| # to do much more complex handling to ensure that arbitrary |
| # objects -- such as Django model instances or querysets |
| # -- can be serialized as JSON. |
| return context |
|
|
| .. note:: |
|
|
| Check out the :doc:`/topics/serialization` documentation for more |
| information on how to correctly transform Django models and querysets into |
| JSON. |
|
|
| This mixin provides a ``render_to_json_response()`` method with the same signature |
| as :func:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin.render_to_response()`. |
| To use it, we need to mix it into a ``TemplateView`` for example, and override |
| ``render_to_response()`` to call ``render_to_json_response()`` instead:: |
|
|
| from django.views.generic import TemplateView |
|
|
|
|
| class JSONView(JSONResponseMixin, TemplateView): |
| def render_to_response(self, context, **response_kwargs): |
| return self.render_to_json_response(context, **response_kwargs) |
|
|
| Equally we could use our mixin with one of the generic views. We can make our |
| own version of :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.DetailView` by mixing |
| ``JSONResponseMixin`` with the |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.BaseDetailView` -- (the |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.DetailView` before template |
| rendering behavior has been mixed in):: |
|
|
| from django.views.generic.detail import BaseDetailView |
|
|
|
|
| class JSONDetailView(JSONResponseMixin, BaseDetailView): |
| def render_to_response(self, context, **response_kwargs): |
| return self.render_to_json_response(context, **response_kwargs) |
|
|
| This view can then be deployed in the same way as any other |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.DetailView`, with exactly the |
| same behavior -- except for the format of the response. |
|
|
| If you want to be really adventurous, you could even mix a |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.DetailView` subclass that is able |
| to return *both* HTML and JSON content, depending on some property of |
| the HTTP request, such as a query argument or an HTTP header. Mix in both the |
| ``JSONResponseMixin`` and a |
| :class:`~django.views.generic.detail.SingleObjectTemplateResponseMixin`, |
| and override the implementation of |
| :func:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin.render_to_response()` |
| to defer to the appropriate rendering method depending on the type of response |
| that the user requested:: |
|
|
| from django.views.generic.detail import SingleObjectTemplateResponseMixin |
|
|
|
|
| class HybridDetailView( |
| JSONResponseMixin, SingleObjectTemplateResponseMixin, BaseDetailView |
| ): |
| def render_to_response(self, context): |
| # Look for a 'format=json' GET argument |
| if self.request.GET.get("format") == "json": |
| return self.render_to_json_response(context) |
| else: |
| return super().render_to_response(context) |
|
|
| Because of the way that Python resolves method overloading, the call to |
| ``super().render_to_response(context)`` ends up calling the |
| :meth:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin.render_to_response()` |
| implementation of :class:`~django.views.generic.base.TemplateResponseMixin`. |
|
|