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Django Design Patterns and Best Practices
Django Design Patterns and Best Practices

Django Design Patterns and Best Practices: Easily build maintainable websites with powerful and relevant Django design patterns

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Django Design Patterns and Best Practices

Chapter 2. Application Design

In this chapter, we will cover the following topics:

  • Gathering requirements
  • Creating a concept document
  • HTML mockups
  • How to divide a project into Apps
  • Whether to write a new app or reuse an existing one
  • Best practices before starting a project
  • Why Python 3?
  • Starting the SuperBook project

Many novice developers approach a new project by beginning to write code right away. More often than not it leads to incorrect assumptions, unused features and lost time. Spending some time with your client in understanding core requirements even in a project short on time can yield incredible results. Managing requirements is a key skill worth learning.

How to gather requirements

 

Innovation is not about saying yes to everything. It's about saying NO to all but the most crucial features.

 
 --Steve Jobs

I saved several doomed projects by spending a few days with the client to carefully listen to their needs and set the right expectations. Armed with nothing but a pencil and paper (or their digital equivalents), the process is incredibly simple but effective. Here are some of the key points to remember while gathering requirements:

  1. Talk directly to the application owners even if they are not technical savvy.
  2. Make sure you listen to their needs fully and note them.
  3. Don't use technical jargon such as "models". Keep it simple and use end-user friendly terms such as a "user profile".
  4. Set the right expectations. If something is not technically feasible or difficult, make sure you tell them right away.
  5. Sketch as much as possible. Humans are visual in nature. Websites more so. Use rough lines and stick figures...

Are you a story teller?

So what is this one page write-up? It is a simple document that explains how it feels to use the site. In almost all the projects I have worked with, when someone new joins the team, they don't normally go through every bit of paperwork. He or she would be thrilled if they find a single-page document that quickly tells them what the site is meant to be.

You can call this document whatever you like—concept document, market requirements document, customer experience documentation, or even an Epic Fragile StoryLog™ (patent pending). It really doesn't matter.

The document should focus on the user experience rather than technical or implementation details. Make it short and interesting to read. In fact, Joel Spolsky's rule number one on documenting requirements is "Be Funny".

If possible, write about a typical user (persona in marketing speak), the problem they are facing, and how the web application solves it. Imagine how they would...

HTML mockups

In the early days of building web applications, tools such as Photoshop and Flash were used extensively to get pixel-perfect mockups. They are hardly recommended or used anymore.

Giving a native and consistent experience across smartphones, tablets, laptops, and other platforms is now considered more important than getting that pixel-perfect look. In fact, most web designers directly create layouts on HTML.

Creating an HTML mockup is a lot faster and easier than before. If your web designer is unavailable, developers can use a CSS framework such as Bootstrap or ZURB Foundation framework to create pretty decent mockups.

The goal of creating a mockup is to create a realistic preview of the website. It should not merely focus on details and polish to look closer to the final product compared to a sketch, but add interactivity as well. Make your static HTML come to life with working links and some simple JavaScript-driven interactivity.

A good mockup can give 80 percent of customer...

Designing the application

When you have a fairly good idea of what you need to build, you can start to think about the implementation in Django. Once again, it is tempting to start coding away. However, when you spend a few minutes thinking about the design, you can find plenty of different ways to solve a design problem.

You can also start designing tests first, as advocated in Test-driven Design (TDD) methodology. We will see more of the TDD approach in the testing chapter.

Whichever approach you take, it is best to stop and think—"Which are the different ways in which I can implement this? What are the trade-offs? Which factors are more important in our context? Finally, which approach is the best?"

Experienced Django developers look at the overall project in different ways. Sticking to the DRY principle (or sometimes because they get lazy), they think—"Have I seen this functionality before? For instance, can this social login feature be implemented using a...

Before starting the project

While preparing a development environment, make sure that you have the following in place:

  • A fresh Python virtual environment: Python 3 includes the venv module or you can install virtualenv. Both of them prevent polluting your global Python library.
  • Version control: Always use a version control tool such as Git or Mercurial. They are life savers. You can also make changes much more confidently and fearlessly.
  • Choose a project template: Django's default project template is not the only option. Based on your needs try others such as twoscoops (https://github.com/twoscoops/django-twoscoops-project) or edge (https://github.com/arocks/edge).
  • Deployment pipeline: I usually worry about this a bit later, but having an easy deployment process helps to show early progress. I prefer Fabric or Ansible.

How to gather requirements


 

Innovation is not about saying yes to everything. It's about saying NO to all but the most crucial features.

 
 --Steve Jobs

I saved several doomed projects by spending a few days with the client to carefully listen to their needs and set the right expectations. Armed with nothing but a pencil and paper (or their digital equivalents), the process is incredibly simple but effective. Here are some of the key points to remember while gathering requirements:

  1. Talk directly to the application owners even if they are not technical savvy.

  2. Make sure you listen to their needs fully and note them.

  3. Don't use technical jargon such as "models". Keep it simple and use end-user friendly terms such as a "user profile".

  4. Set the right expectations. If something is not technically feasible or difficult, make sure you tell them right away.

  5. Sketch as much as possible. Humans are visual in nature. Websites more so. Use rough lines and stick figures. No need to be perfect.

  6. Break down process...

Are you a story teller?


So what is this one page write-up? It is a simple document that explains how it feels to use the site. In almost all the projects I have worked with, when someone new joins the team, they don't normally go through every bit of paperwork. He or she would be thrilled if they find a single-page document that quickly tells them what the site is meant to be.

You can call this document whatever you like—concept document, market requirements document, customer experience documentation, or even an Epic Fragile StoryLog™ (patent pending). It really doesn't matter.

The document should focus on the user experience rather than technical or implementation details. Make it short and interesting to read. In fact, Joel Spolsky's rule number one on documenting requirements is "Be Funny".

If possible, write about a typical user (persona in marketing speak), the problem they are facing, and how the web application solves it. Imagine how they would explain the experience to a friend. Try...

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Description

If you want to learn how best to utilize commonly found patterns and learn best practices in developing applications with Django, this is the book for you. This book, like Django itself, is accessible to amateur and professional developers alike and assumes little in the way of prior experience. Although written for Python 3, the majority of the code in this book works in Python 2 or can be easily translated.

Who is this book for?

If you want to learn how best to utilize commonly found patterns and learn best practices in developing applications with Django, this is the book for you. This book, like Django itself, is accessible to amateur and professional developers alike and assumes little in the way of prior experience.

What you will learn

  • Understand common design patterns that can help you write better Django code
  • Discover the latest best practices and idioms in this rapidly evolving framework
  • Deep dive into various aspects of Django from Models and Views to testing and deployment
  • Get to grips with difficult topics such as dealing with legacy code and debugging
  • Familiarize yourself with the various nuances of web development such as browser attacks and databases
  • Reduce the maintenance burden with welltested, cleaner code
  • Show your work to the world by learning about hosting, deploying, and securing your Django projects
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Length: 222 pages
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Language : English
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Table of Contents

13 Chapters
1. Django and Patterns Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
2. Application Design Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
3. Models Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
4. Views and URLs Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
5. Templates Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
6. Admin Interface Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
7. Forms Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
8. Dealing with Legacy Code Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
9. Testing and Debugging Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
10. Security Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
11. Production-ready Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
A. Python 2 versus Python 3 Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Index Chevron down icon Chevron up icon

Customer reviews

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Rating distribution
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Half star icon 4.7
(7 Ratings)
5 star 85.7%
4 star 0%
3 star 14.3%
2 star 0%
1 star 0%
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kaytam Nov 26, 2015
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
This book is great for beginners and seasoned developers of the Django framework. It is relatively easy to follow and the examples' content and rationale are well explained. I haven't gotten through the whole book, but so far it is dense with great information and advice.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
anand reddy pandikunta Apr 15, 2015
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
You need to be familiar with Python & know basics of building an app with Django before starting this book!I have read articles written by Arun Ravindran and watched his screencasts & talks. So I brought the book as soon as it released.The book has various design patterns to solve everyday problems while building web apps. It also engages readers with stories & examples to get a better understanding of concepts.If You have started Django, this book will save a lot of time. If You are an experienced developer, You will find some patterns & best practices to clean up Your code.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Marc M. S. Jun 23, 2015
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
You have to know some basics of Python and Django to read this book, but it is very readable and well organized.It offer the opportunity to understand deeply the django framework and designs patterns. It provide solutions to every day problems a django developer may encounter. The examples provided allow you to practice and understand the key concepts. I recommand to improve your best practices.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Mark Lyon Aug 20, 2015
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
This book offer helpful guidance for beginning Django developers.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Alex Jun 16, 2015
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
Arun has made an excellent contribution to the myriad "learn Django" environment. I highly recommend this book to people who have completed the infamous polls tutorial as it represents a great survey of topics that the beginner would greatly benefit from using in practice.The treatments on models and class based views are particularly noteworthy. It would have been nice seeing some more content on custom template tags but alas that's almost a book in and of itself. Forms are properly treated as the data validating powerhouses they are. The comprehensive overview of testing is really fantastic along with recommendations on debugging tools that are standard amongst Django developers.If you are looking to go from beginner to affective in Django - this is a great way to do that.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
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