Django for Beginners (Book)
Django for Beginners
Build websites with Python and Django
About the Book
Django for Beginners is a project-based introduction to Django, the popular Python-based web framework. Suitable for total beginners who have never built a website before as well as professional programmers looking for a fast-paced guide to modern web development and Django fundamentals.
In the book you’ll learn how to:
- Build 5 websites from scratch, including a Blog and Newspaper
- Deploy online using security best practices
- Implement signup, login, logout, password change, and password reset
- Customize the look and feel of your sites
- Write tests and run them for all your code
- Add permissions and authorizations to make your app more secure
If you’re curious about Python-based web development, Django for Beginners is a best-practices guide to writing and deploying your own websites quickly.
Reviews
"If you’re looking for a guide into the world of Django, then the three-step of Django for Beginners, Django for APIs, and Django for Professionals is ideal: get up and running, get into APIs, which are a cornerstone of modern app development, and then add the bits you need to your fledging app into production, from databases and static files, to user accounts and security. It’s a long road. Will’s books are an awesome companion."—CARLTON GIBSON, Django Fellow and Django REST Framework core contributor
"When readers interested in web development ask me what to read next after Python Crash Course, I refer them to Will's books: Django for Beginners, Django for APIs, and Django for Professionals. I highly recommend you check out his work."—ERIC MATTHES, author of Python Crash Course
"Will's books are a fantastic resource for web development with Django and Python. I highly recommended them.”—JEFF TRIPLETT, Python Software Foundation Director, DEFNA President, and REVSYS Partner
Bundles that include this book
Table of Contents
-
Chapter 0: Introduction
- Prerequisites
- Why Django
- Why This Book
- What’s New in Django 4.2
- Book Structure
- Book Layout
- Advice on Getting Stuck
- Community
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 1: Initial Set Up
- The Command Line
- Shell Commands
- Install Python 3 on Windows
- Install Python 3 on Mac
- Python Interactive Mode
- Virtual Environments
- PyPI (Python Package Index)
- Install Django
- First Django Project
- The Development Server
- Text Editors
- VSCode Configurations
- Install Git
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 2: Hello World App
- How Websites Work
- How Web Frameworks Work
- Model-View-Controller vs Model-View-Template
- Initial Set Up
- Create An App
- Your First View
- URLconfs
- Git
- GitHub
- SSH Keys
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 3: Pages App
- Initial Set Up
- Templates
- Class-Based Views
- URLs
- About Page
- Extending Templates
- Tests
- Git and GitHub
- Hosting Options
- Deployment Checklist
- Fly.io
- Deploy to Fly.io
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 4: Message Board App
- Initial Set Up
- Create a Database Model
- Activating models
- Django Admin
- Views/Templates/URLs
- Adding New Posts
- Static Files
- Tests
- GitHub
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 5: Message Board Deployment
- Previous Deployment Checklist
- Environment Variables
- DATABASES
- Pyscopg
- CSRF_TRUSTED_ORIGINS
- Updated Deployment Checklist
- Web Servers
- WSGI
- ASGI
- WhiteNoise
- Middleware
- requirements.txt
- Final Deployment Checklist
- Fly Deployment
- Production Database
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 6: Blog App
- Initial Set Up
- Databases
- Django’s ORM
- Blog Post Models
- Primary Keys and Foreign Keys
- Admin
- URLs
- Views
- Templates
- Static Files
- Individual Blog Pages
- get_absolute_url()
- Tests
- Git
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 7: Forms
- CreateView
- UpdateView
- DeleteView
- Tests
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 8: User Accounts
- Log In
- Updated Homepage
- Log Out Link
- Sign Up
- Sign Up Link
- Static Files
- GitHub
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 9: Blog Deployment
- Gunicorn, Psycopg, and environs
- DATABASES
- WhiteNoise
- requirements.txt
- .dockerignore and .env
- DEBUG
- SECRET_KEY
- ALLOWED_HOSTS and CSRF_TRUSTED_ORIGINS
- Fly Launch
- Updated ALLOWED_HOSTS and CSRF_TRUSTED_ORIGINS
- Fly Deployment
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 10: Custom User Model
- Initial Set Up
- Git
- Custom User Model
- Forms
- Superuser
- Tests
- Git
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 11: User Authentication
- Templates
- URLs
- Admin
- Tests
- Git
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 12: Bootstrap
- Pages App
- Tests
- Testing Philosophy
- Bootstrap
- Signup Form
- Git
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 13: Password Change and Reset
- Password Change
- Customizing Password Change
- Password Reset
- Custom Templates
- Try It Out
- Git
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 14: Newspaper App
- Articles App
- URLs and Views
- Detail/Edit/Delete
- Create Page
- Additional Links
- Git
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 15: Permissions and Authorization
- Improved CreateView
- Authorizations
- Mixins
- LoginRequiredMixin
- UpdateView and DeleteView
- Template Logic
- Git
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 16: Comments
- Model
- Admin
- Template
- Comment Form
- Comment View
- Comment Template
- Comment Post View
- New Comment Link
- Git
- Conclusion
-
Chapter 17: Deployment
- Static Files
- Deployment Checklist
- Gunicorn, Psycopg, and environs
- DATABASES
- WhiteNoise
- requirements.txt
- .dockerignore and .env
- DEBUG and SECRET_KEY
- ALLOWED_HOSTS and CSRF_TRUSTED_ORIGINS
- Fly Deployment
- Production Database
- Deployment Conclusion
-
Chapter 18: Conclusion
- Next Steps
- 3rd Party Packages
- Learning Resources
- Python Books
- Feedback
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