Django, creating a custom 500/404 error page

Question

Following the tutorial found here exactly, I cannot create a custom 500 or 404 error page. If I do type in a bad url, the page gives me the default error page. Is there anything I should be checking for that would prevent a custom page from showing up?

File directories:

mysite/
    mysite/
        __init__.py
        __init__.pyc
        settings.py
        settings.pyc
        urls.py
        urls.pyc
        wsgi.py
        wsgi.pyc
    polls/
        templates/
            admin/
                base_site.html
            404.html
            500.html
            polls/
                detail.html
                index.html
        __init__.py
        __init__.pyc
        admin.py
        admin.pyc
        models.py
        models.pyc
        tests.py
        urls.py
        urls.pyc
        view.py
        views.pyc
    templates/
    manage.py

within mysite/settings.py I have these enabled:

DEBUG = False
TEMPLATE_DEBUG = DEBUG

#....

TEMPLATE_DIRS = (
    'C:/Users/Me/Django/mysite/templates', 
)

within mysite/polls/urls.py:

from django.conf.urls import patterns, url

from polls import views

urlpatterns = patterns('',
    url(r'^$', views.index, name='index'),
    url(r'^(?P<poll_id>\d+)/$', views.detail, name='detail'),
    url(r'^(?P<poll_id>\d+)/results/$', views.results, name='results'),
    url(r'^(?P<poll_id>\d+)/vote/$', views.vote, name='vote'),
)

I can post any other code necessary, but what should I be changing to get a custom 500 error page if I use a bad url?

Edit

SOLUTION: I had an additional

TEMPLATE_DIRS

within my settings.py and that was causing the problem

Answer 1

settings.py::::

DEBUG = False
TEMPLATE_DEBUG = DEBUG
ALLOWED_HOSTS = ['localhost']  #provide your host name

and just add your 404.html and 500.html pages in templates folder. remove 404.html and 500.html from templates in polls app.

Answer 2

In Django 2.* you can use this construction in views.py

def handler404(request, exception):
    return render(request, 'errors/404.html', locals())

In settings.py

DEBUG = False

if DEBUG is False:
    ALLOWED_HOSTS = [
        '127.0.0.1:8000',
        '*',
    ]

if DEBUG is True:
    ALLOWED_HOSTS = []

In urls.py

# https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/2.0/topics/http/views/#customizing-error-views
handler404 = 'YOUR_APP_NAME.views.handler404'

Usually i creating default_app and handle site-wide errors, context processors in it.

Answer 3

As one single line (for 404 generic page):

from django.shortcuts import render_to_response
from django.template import RequestContext

return render_to_response('error/404.html', {'exception': ex},
                                      context_instance=RequestContext(request), status=404)

Answer 4

Try moving your error templates to .../Django/mysite/templates/ ?

I'm note sure about this one, but i think these need to be "global" to the website.

Answer 5

Official answer:

Here is the link to the official documentation on how to set up custom error views:

https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/stable/topics/http/views/#customizing-error-views

It says to add lines like these in your URLconf (setting them anywhere else will have no effect):

handler404 = 'mysite.views.my_custom_page_not_found_view'
handler500 = 'mysite.views.my_custom_error_view'
handler403 = 'mysite.views.my_custom_permission_denied_view'
handler400 = 'mysite.views.my_custom_bad_request_view'

You can also customise the CSRF error view by modifying the setting CSRF_FAILURE_VIEW.

Default error handlers:

It's worth reading the documentation of the default error handlers, page_not_found, server_error, permission_denied and bad_request. By default, they use these templates if they can find them, respectively: 404.html, 500.html, 403.html, and 400.html.

So if all you want to do is make pretty error pages, just create those files in a TEMPLATE_DIRS directory, you don't need to edit URLConf at all. Read the documentation to see which context variables are available.

In Django 1.10 and later, the default CSRF error view uses the template 403_csrf.html.

Gotcha:

Don't forget that DEBUG must be set to False for these to work, otherwise, the normal debug handlers will be used.

Answer 6

From the page you referenced:

When you raise Http404 from within a view, Django will load a special view devoted to handling 404 errors. It finds it by looking for the variable handler404 in your root URLconf (and only in your root URLconf; setting handler404 anywhere else will have no effect), which is a string in Python dotted syntax – the same format the normal URLconf callbacks use. A 404 view itself has nothing special: It’s just a normal view.

So I believe you need to add something like this to your urls.py:

handler404 = 'views.my_404_view'

and similar for handler500.