web2py cross applications global setting good practice - python

I understand there is no such a thing like setting.py in Django for web2py . But is there a good place for these global setting for web2py ?
I would like to put things like secret key, global constant and others.

Although they might not work the same under the hood, you can still put your application-wide global setting inside this file applications/yourapp/models/0_whatever_name.py
Content in this file will be defined before (each) request reaches your app.
Or you can simply append your app-wide global definitions into applications/yourapp/models/db.py By default it already contains lots of settings for this app.

Related

Make global variables available in multiple modules

I am creating an application consisting of several modules. There is one main.py file which will be the file to run the application. The main.py file will load the configuration file(s) and put them in the 'config'-variable. It will also import the application-module-file (the file which holds the source-code of the application itself, a.k.a. application-class) and start the instance.
I am not very experienced in coding Python, and my biggest question is if I am doing it the right way, by using a main-file to handle all needed stuff (loading configuration-files for example). The problem I am having right now is that I cannot access the 'config'-variable that was defined in the main.py-file from any other module and/or Python-file.
Is it possible to make a global variable for configuration-values exc.? I know in PHP I used to create a singleton object which holds all the specific global arguments. I could also create a global 'ROOT'-variable to hold the full path to the root of the application, which is needed to load/import new files, this is also not possible in Python as far as I know.
I hope someone can help me out of this or send me in the right direction so I can continue working on this project.
The answer seems to be by Matthias:
Use from AppName.modules import settings and then access the data in the module with settings.value. According to PEP-8, the style guide for Python code, wildcard imports should be avoided and would in fact lead to undesirable behaviour in this case.
Thanks you all for the help!

Is there a way to share common configuration using Paste Deploy?

This is a pretty simple idea conceptually. In terms of specifics, I'm working with a pretty generic Kotti installation, where I'm customizing some pages / templates.
Much of my configuration is shared between a production and development server. Currently, these settings are included in two separate ini files. It would be nice to DRY this configuration, with common settings in one place.
I'm quite open to this happening in python or an an ini file / section (or perhaps a third, yet-to-be-considered place). I think it's equivalent to use a [DEFAULT] section, or pass dictionaries to loadapp via global_conf, but that seems to be processed in a squirrelly way. For example, Kotti thinks I've properly set sqlalchemy.url, but sqlalchemy iteself fails on url = opts.pop('url'). Moreover, since Kotti defines some default settings, Paste doesn't end up searching for them in the global_conf (e.g., kotti_configurators).
I don't like the idea of passing in a large dict for %(var)s substitution, as it requires effectively renaming all of the shared variables.
In my initial experiments with Paste Deploy, it demands a "main" section in each ini file. So, I don't think I can just use a use = config:shared.ini line. But that's conceptually close to what I'd like to do.
Is there a way to explicitly (and properly) include settings from DEFAULT or global_conf? Or perhaps do this programmatically with python on the results of loadapp?
For example, Kotti thinks I've properly set sqlalchemy.url, but sqlalchemy iteself fails on url = opts.pop('url').
If you think something is odd and you're asking on SO it'd be wise to show a stacktrace and an example of what you tried to do.
Kotti gets its settings the same as any pyramid app. Your entry point (def main(global_conf, **settings) usually) is passed the global_conf and settings dictionary. You're then responsible for fixing that up and shuffling it off into the configurator.
For various reasons PasteDeploy keeps the global_conf separate from the settings, thus you're responsible for merging them if you wish.
[DEFAULT]
foo = bar
[app:main]
use = egg:myapp#main
baz = xyz
def main(global_conf, **app_settings):
settings = global_conf
settings.update(app_settings)
config = Configurator(settings=settings)
config.include('kotti')
return config.make_wsgi_app()

How can you define a persistent variable in Django

I have a Django project, and what I would like to do is be able to create a reference to a variable defined in urls.py that is kept for the duration of the process.
I've tried an approach using global vars - but for whatever reason, the value of the variable in urls.py is the initial value - even if I change it somewhere else. I've followed the concepts as explained here, but just doesn't work.
However, when I try such a scenario outside of Django, it works as expected.
I think I'm missing a trick (or two) with Django - it's great, I'm new to it, and I think I'm going down the wrong path. Should I be using the caching stuff included with Django to store the variable, or is that even more off track?
Many thanks for any pointers.
I agree with S.Lott's comment, your question is a little vague. I think you're trying to reference some variable defined in urls? You know you can import urls.py into any other python script as long as it's on your PYTHONPATH. Assuming you're talking about a Django view when you say a "process", you could import a URL directly into a view function:
def foo_view(request):
from bar_app.urls import BAR_URL_PATTERN
Please give us more information on your specific use case, and I'll amend my answer to give you a better response.
Good Luck! I hope you're enjoying your first foray into the wonderful world of Django!

Python Django Global Variables

I'm looking for simple but recommended way in Django to store a variable in memory only. When Apache restarts or the Django development server restarts, the variable is reset back to 0. More specifically, I want to count how many times a particular action takes place on each model instance (database record), but for performance reasons, I don't want to store these counts in the database. I don't care if the counts disappear after a server restart. But as long as the server is up, I want these counts to be consistent between the Django shell and the web interface, and I want to be able to return how many times the action has taken place on each model instance.
I don't want the variables to be associated with a user or session because I might want to return these counts without being logged in (and I want the counts to be consistent no matter what user is logged in). Am I describing a global variable? If so, how do I use one in Django? I've noticed the files like the urls.py, settings.py and models.py seems to be parsed only once per server startup (by contrast to the views.py which seems to be parsed eache time a request is made). Does this mean I should declare my variables in one of those files? Or should I store it in a model attribute somehow (as long as it sticks around for as long as the server is running)? This is probably an easy question, but I'm just not sure how it's done in Django.
Any comments or advice is much appreciated.
Thanks,
Joe
Why one mustn't declare global variables? O_o. It just looks like a propaganda. If the author knows what he wants and what side-effects will be, why not. Maybe it's just a quick experiment.
You could declare your counter as a model class-member. Then to deal with race condition you have to add a method that will wait if some other client, from another thread works with counter. Something like this:
import threading
class MyModel(ModelBase):
_counter = 0
_counter_lock = threading.Lock()
#classmethod
def increment_counter(cls):
with cls._counter_lock:
cls._counter += 1
def some_action(self):
# core code
self.increment_counter()
# somewhere else
print MyModel._counter
Remember however: you have to have your application in one process. So if you've deployed the application under Apache, be sure it is configured to spawn many threads, but not many processes. If you're experimenting with ./manage.py run no actions are required.
You mustn't declare global variables. Settings (constants) are OK if done right. But variables violate with shared-nothing architecture and might cause a lot of trouble. (best case they'll be inconsistent)
I would simply store those statistics in the cache. (Well, actually I would store them in the database but you made clear you believe it will have a negative impact on performance, so...)
The new incr() and decr() methods are especially suitable for counting. See docs for more info.
I would create a "config.py" file on the root directory. and put all global variables inside:
x = 10
my_string = ''
at "view.py":
from your_project import config
def MyClass(reuqest):
y = config.x + 20
my_title = config.my_string
...
The benefit of creating this file is the variables can cross multiple .py files and it is easy to manage.
If you want to avoid the hassle with Django database, e.g. migrations or performance issues, you might consider in-memory database redis. Redis guarantees consistency even if there are multiple Django processes.
You can use variables from settings.py
see below example. It's an app that counts requests
settings.py
REQ_COUNTER = 0
View.py
from {**your project folder name **}.settings import REQ_COUNTER
def CountReq(request):
global = REQ_COUNTER
REQ_COUNTER = REQ_COUNTER + 1
return HttpResponse(REQ_COUNTER)
Thanks :)

What should I name my global module in Python?

I'm writing an application in Python, and I've got a number of universal variables (such as the reference to the main window, the user settings, and the list of active items in the UI) which have to be accessible from all parts of the program1. I only just realized I've named the module globals.py and I'm importing the object which contains those variables with a from globals import globals statement at the top of my files.
Obviously, this works, but I'm a little leery about naming my global object the same as the Python builtin. Unfortunately, I can't think of a much better naming convention for it. global and all are also Python builtins, universal seems imprecise, state isn't really the right idea. I'm leaning towards static or env, although both have a specific meaning in computer terms which suggests a different concept.
So, what (in Python) would you call the module which contains variables global to all your other modules?
1 I realize I could pass these (or the single object containing them) as a variable into every other function I call. This ends up being infeasible, not just because it makes the startup code and function signatures really ugly.
I would try to avoid such a global container module altogether, and instead put these variables into their own modules, which can then be imported from all parts of the system.
For example, the main window would probably go into a variable in main.py. User settings could go into usersettings.py which would provide functions to view and change the settings.
If another part of the system needs to access the user settings, that's a simple matter of:
from usersettings import get_setting, set_setting
...
# Do stuff with settings
A similar approach could probably be used for other stuff that needs to be globally accessible. This leads to clearer separation of concerns and more testable code, since you can test modules in isolation without depending on the globals module all the time.
I'd call it env. There's little risk that someone will confuse it with os.environ (especially if you organize your code so that you can call it myapp.environ).
I'd also make everything exposed by myapp.environ a property of a class, so that I can put breakpoints in the setter when the day comes that I need to.
`config` or `settings`
top? top_level?
from globals import Globals
This will fix the conflict and also follows PEP 8 recommendations.
Also, in other cases like this, Roget's Thesaurus is your friend. I always keep a copy nearby.
global is a keyword, not a built-in. 'globals' is not a keyword, but is a built-in function. It can be assigned to, but is bad practice. Code checkers like pylint and pychecker can catch these accidental assignments. How about config?

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