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August, 2011

  1. Basic Django setup with VirtualEnv and Pip

    August 13, 2011 by Helmut

    For a while I struggled to get an ideal setup procedure for new Django projects. On an Ubuntu-based system, this is the process I now follow for each new Django project (I assume MySQL is already installed):

    • 1. Change to your project’s directory
    • 2. Install VirtualEnv
    sudo easy_install -U virtualenv
    • 3. Initialize the virtual environment for your project (substitute your own directory for “ve” if you want)
    virtualenv --no-site-packages ve/
    • 4. Activate the virtual environment
    source ve/bin/activate
    • 5. Install Pip (UPDATE: this is only required if you want to update to the latest version, since Pip is included with VirtualEnv)
    easy_install -U pip
    • 6. Install Django
    pip install Django
    • 7. Install MySQL bindings for python
    pip install MySQL-python
sudo apt-get install libmysqlclient-dev
    • 8. Install Django-South, if you use it
    pip install south
    • 9. Create your Django project, application, etc.

    I’ve tried different approaches (including Vagrant), but I like this method because it is very simple. How do you go about a new Django setup? Anything that can be improved?

    UPDATE: Thanks to Doug Warren for some pointers on what to improve. Further changes coming soon.

    Category Django | Tags: ,,,, | 3 Comments

  2. Multiple Apache websites on Ubuntu

    August 8, 2011 by Helmut

    To set up multiple local websites on Apache, follow this process.

    • 1. Install Apache 2 via synaptic or apt-get (package: apache2).
    • 2. Create the following folders (change the location to your liking) and copy your website files to the “root” folder:
    /home/user/www/website1/
/home/user/www/website1/root/
/home/user/www/website1/logs/
    • 3. Create new site configuration file (e.g. “website1″) in /etc/apache2/sites-available/ with the following contents:
    <VirtualHost *:80>
    ServerAdmin website1@localhost
    ServerName website1.dev
    DocumentRoot "/home/user/www/website1/root/"
    ErrorLog /home/user/www/website1/logs/error.log
    CustomLog /home/user/www/website1/logs/access.log combined
</VirtualHost>
    • 4. Add the following line to your /etc/hosts file:
    127.0.0.1    website1.dev
    • 5. Set permissions so that Apache can access the website by running the following on the command line:
    sudo chgrp -R www-data /home/user/www/website1/
sudo chmod -R g+w /home/user/www/website1/
    • 6. Enable the new website by running the following on the command line:
    sudo a2ensite website1
    • 7. Restart Apache by running the following on the command line:
    sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart
    • 8. Now visit http://website1.dev in your browser to see the website.

    Category Apache | Tags: ,,, | 1 Comment