Creating a redistributable django app

Question

In Java world, a common way to distribute a web app is to package it along with Apache Tomcat. What is the appropriate way to achieve something like that with Django (or any WSGI application for that matter)?

Answer 1

There are two camps for distributing apps in django. It also depends on what you mean by apps.

1. If you mean an apps is in django terms as in 'pluggable apps' that is separated from the project, then it would be best to use setuptools to package those 'pluggable apps'. Many django 'pluggable apps' are distributed like this. For example:
   • django-tagging
   • django-registration
   • etc.
2. But if you mean an apps is a full-blown apps (the whole war file) as in Java EE terms, then you would have all off your apps inside a your project, and you would just distribute the project in any forms. Normally you would just zip it. You don't need to install it with setuptools or what so ever, as you would run your project from the project folder. Examples in this camps are:
   • Pinax
   • Satchmo

The first way is convenient if you already have django project running and you want to re-use those pluggable apps in many other projects. This is really good if you are building non-monolithic web application or an in-house application/websites or a reusable application . It's also convenient if you are managing your project and those pluggable apps by yourself. It's sort of inconvenient (to some extent) if you want to sell an apps to a customer with this kind of approach because your project and your pluggable apps lives in a different directories. Some people said that they don't have any issues with this approach.

The second way would be more convenient if you are selling your apps to a client because all of the apps is inside your project and you would only extract your project when you are at the client side. This style is more often called the monolithic style. Java EE and Ruby on Rails have a monolithic deployment style. You wouldn't need to install your 'pluggable apps' one by one (assuming you don't use any external pluggable apps in your project) when you are at the client side. But again, you would have some issues if you want to reuse those small apps inside the projects. If you don't have any plan to re-use those small apps, then this way is good enough.

Answer 2

setuptools is a common way to distribute any Python packages, Django apps included, and many of the more substantial Django apps (Pinax comes to mind) will either distribute through the cheeseshop or as tarballs or zips with setuptools-produced setup.py files.

Less substantial reusable apps will just distribute as compressed files, which works fine as they should be highly portable.

Answer 3

A django app is not much different from a python module, which you can package using python's setuptools.