How to use Django on Plesk

[Krydos]

We will update our wiki article on how to get started with Django, but just posting a quick example here so people can comment and ask questions on this thread.

1. Create a directory on your main domain called djangotest. If you were transferred from cPanel your main domain will be parked on the public_html directory. If you created a new account on Plesk your directory will be httpdocs.
2. Create an .htaccess file inside the djangotest directory with these contents:

   Options +ExecCGI
   RewriteEngine On
   RewriteBase /
   RewriteRule ^(media/.*)$ - [L]
   RewriteRule ^(admin_media/.*)$ - [L]
   RewriteRule ^(djangotest/dispatch\.wsgi/.*)$ - [L]
   RewriteRule ^(.*)$ djangotest/djangotest/dispatch.wsgi/$1 [QSA,PT,L]
   

    

3. Next create another djangotest directory within the first djangotest directory. This is the standard directory structure for a Django project so don't give me that look. I'm sure they did it on purpose just to make it more confusing for you. Also you can't name your Django project django either, so don't even bother trying. That's why we're calling this example djangotest.
4. Inside the second djangotest directory make a file named dispatch.wsgi with these contents:

   import os, sys
   
   # edit path below
   sys.path.append("/home/domain.helioho.st/httpdocs/djangotest")
   
   from django.core.wsgi import get_wsgi_application
   os.environ.setdefault('DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE', 'djangotest.settings')
   application = get_wsgi_application()

5. Make sure you edit the path in the dispatch.wsgi file. On Plesk your path is /home/ and then your main domain, and then httpdocs if you're a new account or public_html if you've been transferred from cPanel.

6. Inside the second djangotest directory create an empty file named __init__.py

7. Inside the second djangotest directory make a file named urls.py with these contents:

   from django.contrib import admin
   from django.urls import path
   
   urlpatterns = [
   #    path('admin/', admin.site.urls),
   ]

8. Inside the second djangotest directory make a file named settings.py with these contents:

   from pathlib import Path
   
   # Build paths inside the project like this: BASE_DIR / 'subdir'.
   BASE_DIR = Path(__file__).resolve().parent.parent
   
   # Quick-start development settings - unsuitable for production
   # See https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/4.1/howto/deployment/checklist/
   # SECURITY WARNING: keep the secret key used in production secret!
   SECRET_KEY = 'django-makeyoursecretbetterthanthis'
   
   # SECURITY WARNING: don't run with debug turned on in production!
   DEBUG = True
   
   ALLOWED_HOSTS = ['*']
   
   # Application definition
   INSTALLED_APPS = [
       'django.contrib.admin',
       'django.contrib.auth',
       'django.contrib.contenttypes',
       'django.contrib.sessions',
       'django.contrib.messages',
       'django.contrib.staticfiles',
   ]
   MIDDLEWARE = [
       'django.middleware.security.SecurityMiddleware',
       'django.contrib.sessions.middleware.SessionMiddleware',
       'django.middleware.common.CommonMiddleware',
       'django.middleware.csrf.CsrfViewMiddleware',
       'django.contrib.auth.middleware.AuthenticationMiddleware',
       'django.contrib.messages.middleware.MessageMiddleware',
       'django.middleware.clickjacking.XFrameOptionsMiddleware',
   ]
   ROOT_URLCONF = 'djangotest.urls'
   TEMPLATES = [
       {
           'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
           'DIRS': [],
           'APP_DIRS': True,
           'OPTIONS': {
               'context_processors': [
                   'django.template.context_processors.debug',
                   'django.template.context_processors.request',
                   'django.contrib.auth.context_processors.auth',
                   'django.contrib.messages.context_processors.messages',
               ],
           },
       },
   ]
   WSGI_APPLICATION = 'djangotest.wsgi.application'
   # Database
   # https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/4.1/ref/settings/#databases
   DATABASES = {
       'default': {
           'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.sqlite3',
           'NAME': BASE_DIR / 'db.sqlite3',
       }
   }
   # Password validation
   # https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/4.1/ref/settings/#auth-password-validators
   AUTH_PASSWORD_VALIDATORS = [
       {
           'NAME': 'django.contrib.auth.password_validation.UserAttributeSimilarityValidator',
       },
       {
           'NAME': 'django.contrib.auth.password_validation.MinimumLengthValidator',
       },
       {
           'NAME': 'django.contrib.auth.password_validation.CommonPasswordValidator',
       },
       {
           'NAME': 'django.contrib.auth.password_validation.NumericPasswordValidator',
       },
   ]
   # Internationalization
   # https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/4.1/topics/i18n/
   LANGUAGE_CODE = 'en-us'
   TIME_ZONE = 'UTC'
   USE_I18N = True
   USE_TZ = True
   # Static files (CSS, JavaScript, Images)
   # https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/4.1/howto/static-files/
   STATIC_URL = 'static/'
   # Default primary key field type
   # https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/4.1/ref/settings/#default-auto-field
   DEFAULT_AUTO_FIELD = 'django.db.models.BigAutoField'

9. Make sure your directory structure and files look like this:

   djangotest/
   ├── djangotest
   │   ├── dispatch.wsgi
   │   ├── __init__.py
   │   ├── settings.py
   │   └── urls.py
   └── .htaccess
   
   1 directory, 5 files

10. If you did everything right it should look like this: https://krydos.heliohost.org/djangotest/

Edited December 8, 2022 by Krydos
some accounts need execcgi

[amalgd]

I am trying to setup a Django project by adopting instructions as above. It is not working

https://mainstay.heliohost.org/mainstayerp

I see this in the log:

[core:alert] /home/mainstay.heliohost.org/public_html/mainstayerp/.htaccess: Options not allowed here

can you please help?

 

[wolstech]

Comment the Options +ExecCGI line out in the .htaccess file and see if it works.

The Options directive isn't supported on Plesk yet (though Krydos does plan to fix that at some point I believe).

[Kairion]

52 minutes ago, amalgd said:

I am trying to setup a Django project by adopting instructions as above. It is not working

https://mainstay.heliohost.org/mainstayerp

I see this in the log:

[core:alert] /home/mainstay.heliohost.org/public_html/mainstayerp/.htaccess: Options not allowed here

can you please help?

 

Edit your .htaccess file and remove this line:

Options +ExecCGI

Your .htaccess file now should look like this:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteBase /
RewriteRule ^(media/.*)$ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(admin_media/.*)$ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(djangotest/dispatch\.wsgi/.*)$ - [L]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ djangotest/djangotest/dispatch.wsgi/$1 [QSA,PT,L]

 

If you'd like you can download this zip file: https://kairion.helioho.st/djangotest.zip

And extract it on your web root (httpdocs for Plesk's new account or public_html for cPanel's transfered account). It'll create all directories and files necessary to run this Django example. You just have to open the file /djangotest/djangotest/dispatch.wsgi and find this:

sys.path.append("/home/YOUR_DOMAIN_HERE/httpdocs/djangotest")

And change YOUR_DOMAIN_HERE with your actual domain, e.g.:

sys.path.append("/home/kairion.helioho.st/httpdocs/djangotest")

And then you can access your Django example: https://kairion.helioho.st/djangotest/

[amalgd]

Thank you guys!

I removed the line from from .htaccess, now the page is showing 404 Page not found.

May be it is the missing external packages that my project is using.

I need:

django-nested-admin, django-bootstrap-modal-forms

could I have these install, please?

I found some typos in my .htaccess file and fixed those. Now the error code is 500, which is expected due to the missing dependencies, I guess.

I found this in the log:

TypeError: sequence of byte string values expected, value of type str found

[an4s911]

Is it possible to give instructions on how to setup multi-app django project on plesk. And also how to serve the django app on the root '/' of the domain instead of inside a sub directory (like /djangotest).