I am a complete newbie looking to build a voluntary organisation web site which could have a high degree of personalisation with quite a few SQL forms. Django ORM and Django CMS look close to what I might need.
Can anyone please advise on how I could use Django ORM on a PC?
- Can Django ORM be installed on a PC and how much memory and diskspace would it need?
- Can Django ORM be accessed by a remorte PC over the Cloud? (e.g. Installed on say Blue Host
My concern is Django ORM is a form of CASE tool and if so, it may run very slowly on a PC.
I’m not sure where you’re getting your information, but I think you may have a bit of a wrong impression as to what Django is and does.
The Django ORM is definitely not a CASE tool by most definitions of the term. That component of the Django framework is the interface layer between Django and your database.
If you want a better picture of what Django is and does, I’d start with the overview page. Then I’d suggest looking at both the Django at a glance page and the first page of the tutorial to determine whether or not Django is the right tool for you.
The important thing to remember here is that Django is not WordPress, Drupal, LifeRay, etc. It’s much more a developer’s toolkit.
If that’s what you’re looking for, great, we’re here to help. But be aware that you’re going to need to learn a bit about a lot of different technologies along the way. You will need to learn Python, HTML, CSS and likely JavaScript to be able to produce a finished product.
I’m not entirely familar with the term CASE, but regarding the CMS I’ll toss out Wagtail. It’s built on top of Django and has its own little ecosystem and is growing well.
CASE = Computer-aided software engineering. A bit of an expensive fad from about the mid 80’s to the mid 90’s. The idea was to provide facilities such that “non-programmers could program business systems.”
I never saw one deliver more than 10% of the promised value. As far as I’m concerned it was over-hyped technology that failed to address the root causes of the difficulties involved in delivering “enterprise grade” systems.
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Quite right! These tools were so slow, projects ground to a halt when they were used !
I have done a few Pythin tutorials, no problem. It seems easy enough…so far. So that is a peg in the ground. I used to be fairly good with high level langauages like FCS, Visual Basic and even Cobol !
What is not clear to me is how the Django ORM process works.
My understanding is the process starts with some sort of Class or Data Model which can then be used to cut and alter tables and create SQL queries and code for forms.
I looked at the pages you mentioned and they did not tell me enough. So I suppose I will have to try it and see what I can do with it…
Do you know if it can be installed on a PC and if it works OK?
I could not see anything about memory or disk space requirements to run it on a PC or windows.
Yes it works great on a PC - assuming something reasonably modern (In practical terms, I’d say any Windows 10 or Linux circa 2016+ environment.)
Django itself isn’t an “executable application” - it’s a Python library. If you’re able to run an appropriate Python implementation, Django isn’t going to cause you any problems.
I wouldn’t describe that as being an accurate representation.
The Django ORM Is an interface layer between Django and the database. You’re creating Models as a memory-based representation of the data in your database. You use the ORM instead of SQL to write queries (and updates). Creating HTML forms is a different part of Django, not directly related to the ORM.
The end goal is that you will create views - functions that receive http requests and generate responses. You will assign those views to urls.
The views can pull data from the database (using models), and then generate html data (and forms) to be returned to the browser.
I would strongly suggest you work your way through the official tutorial. Start with the Quick Install guide, and then jump into the tutorial.
Actually getting your hands on this is going to me a lot more effective than any number of words that I can write here.
Mnay thanks for the detailed reply.
I think what I will do is install Django on my PC and work through a few tutorials to see how far I can take it…
I had thought Django ORM was an application rather than a library. Evidently, I was wrong … anyway, I think what I need to do is try it and see what I can do.
Are there any good books or online courses you can suggest to get starrted with Python and Django?
While I always recommend people start out with either or both of the Official Django Tutorial and the Django Girls tutorial, there are lots of materials out there.
A good resource for finding resources is the Awesome Django page, in this case you’ll be looking for the Educational section.
Whatever you do, I most strongly suggest that you don’t try to mix resources. With Django, there’s usually more than one way to do something, and different tutorials may adopt different styles, patterns or techniques. Trying to pull something from “tutorial A” and use it in “tutorial B” without really understanding what you’re doing is going to lead to confusion and likely cause problems.