Django and Serving Static Files

Question

I'm hosting a site on WebFaction using Django/mod_python/Python2.5. I've recently run into the concept of static files (when setting up my Django admin).

From what I understand, serving static files is simply the idea of telling the server to serve files directly from a specific directory, rather than first routing the request through apache, then mod_python, then django, and finally back to the user. In the case of WebFaction this helps especially since there are two Apache servers that your request must go through (your app's server and the main public server).

Why is it that when I setup Django's static files, it only needs the /media folder in /contrib/admin? Is it just that all of Django's static content is related to the admin panel?

When I want to serve my own static content (images, css, etc.) should I include it in the same /media folder or set up another alias for my own content (/my_media)?

Answer 1

Django's static files (e.g. js, css, images, etc.) are all in the media folder, and are related to the admin panel.

On WebFaction to save processing power, and more importantly memory, it is better to serve these from your secondary apache server (or even better from nginx or lighttpd) without having to go through mod_python and Django.

I use the following folder setup for my files:

media
  css
  js
  img
  etc
  admin
     css
     js
     img

See http://forum.webfaction.com/viewtopic.php?id=1981 for how to setup nginx as your secondary server on WebFaction if you are interested.

Answer 2

Yes, the static files used by Django are pretty much related to images, javascript and css for the admin. All other static content comes from your application. You can keep both sets (yours and the admin) under the same server. Just set the appropriate folders in the settings file.

• http://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/ref/settings/#admin-media-prefix
• http://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/ref/settings/#media-root
• http://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/ref/settings/#media-url

See this post for a little more information:

• Django and Static Files