Why does DEBUG False setting make my django Static Files Access fail

Question

Am building an app using Django as my workhorse  All has been well so far - specified db settings  configured static directories  urls  views etc  But trouble started sneaking in the moment I wanted to render my own beautiful and custom 404 html and 500 html pages   I read the docs on custom error handling  and set necessary configurations in UrlsConf  created corresponding views and added the 404 html and the 500 html to my app s template directory  specified in the settings py too    But the docs say you can actually view custom error views until Debug is Off  so I did turn it off to test my stuff  and that s when stuff goes berserk   Not only do I fail to view the custom 404 html  actually  it loads  but because my error pages each contain a graphic error message -as some nice image   the source of the error page loads  but nothing else loads  Not even linked CSS or Javascript   Generally  once I set DEBUG   False  all views will load  but any linked content  CSS  Javascript  Images  etc  wont load  What s happening  Is there something am missing  concerning static files and the DEBUG setting

User · Answer

You can use WhiteNoise to serve static files in production.

Install:

pip install WhiteNoise==2.0.6

And change your wsgi.py file to this:

from django.core.wsgi import get_wsgi_application
from whitenoise.django import DjangoWhiteNoise

application = get_wsgi_application()
application = DjangoWhiteNoise(application)

And you're good to go!

Credit to Handlebar Creative Blog.

BUT, it's really not recommended serving static files this way in production. Your production web server(like nginx) should take care of that.

User · Answer

I agree with Marek Sapkota answer  But you can still use django URFConf to reallocate the url  if static file is requested   Step 1  Define a STATIC ROOT path in settings py  STATIC ROOT   os path join BASE DIR   staticfiles     Step 2  Then collect the static files    python manage py collectstatic   Step 3  Now define your URLConf that if static is in the beginning of url  access files from the static folder staticfiles  NOTE  This is your project s urls py file   from django urls import re path from django views static import serve  urlpattern        re path r  static           serve    document root   settings STATIC ROOT

User · Answer

Johnny s answer is great  but still didn t work for me just by adding those lines described there  Based on that answer  the steps that actually worked for me where    Install WhiteNoise as described   pip install WhiteNoise  Create the STATIC ROOT variable and add WhiteNoise to your MIDDLEWARE variable in settings py    settings py MIDDLEWARE          django middleware security SecurityMiddleware        whitenoise middleware WhiteNoiseMiddleware    add whitenoise      django contrib sessions middleware SessionMiddleware                    STATIC ROOT   os path join BASE DIR   staticfiles     specify static root  Then  modify your wsgi py file as explained in Johnny s answer    wsgi py from django core wsgi import get wsgi application from whitenoise django import DjangoWhiteNoise  application   get wsgi application   application   DjangoWhiteNoise application   After that  deploy your changes to your server  with git or whatever you use   Finally  run the collectstatic option from your manage py on your server  This will copy all files from your static folders into the STATIC ROOT directory we specified before     python manage py collectstatic   You will now see a new folder named staticfiles that contains such elements     After following these steps you can now run your server and will be able to see your static files while in Production mode   Update  In case you had version  lt  4 the changelog indicates that it s no longer necessary to declare the WSGI APPLICATION    projectName wsgi application  on your settings py file

User · Answer

Support for string view arguments to url   is deprecated and will be removed in Django 1 10  My solution is just small correction to Conrado solution above   from django conf import settings import os from django views static import serve as staticserve  if settings DEBUG404      urlpatterns    patterns              r  static   P lt path gt        staticserve                document root   os path join os path dirname   file      static

User · Answer

If you still need to server static locally  e g  for testing without debug  you can run devserver in insecure mode   manage py runserver --insecure

User · Answer

Just open your project urls py  then find this if statement   if settings DEBUG      urlpatterns    patterns           django views static            r  media   P lt path gt       serve    document root   settings MEDIA ROOT        You can change settings DEBUG on True and it will work always  But if your project is a something serious then you should to think about other solutions mentioned above    if True      urlpatterns    patterns           django views static            r  media   P lt path gt       serve    document root   settings MEDIA ROOT        In django 1 10 you can write so   urlpatterns      url r  media   P lt path gt        serve     document root   settings MEDIA ROOT      url r  static   P lt path gt        serve     document root   settings STATIC ROOT

User · Answer

I did the following changes to my project urls py and it worked for me  Add this line    from django conf urls import url  and add     url r  media   P       serve    document root   settings MEDIA ROOT      in urlpatterns

User · Answer

You actually can serve static files in a production Django app  securely and without DEBUG True   Rather than using Django itself  use dj static in your WSGI file  github      requirements txt       dj-static  0 0 6     YOURAPP settings py       STATIC ROOT    staticdir  STATIC URL     staticpath      YOURAPP wsgi py       from django core wsgi import get wsgi application from dj static import Cling  application   Cling get wsgi application

User · Answer

This is Exactly you must type on terminal to run your project without DEBUG   TRUE and then you see all assets  static  file is loading correctly On local server    python manage py runserver --insecure    --insecure   it means you can run server without security mode

User · Answer

If you are using the static serve view in development  you have to have DEBUG   True       Warning      This will only work if DEBUG is True       That s because this view is grossly   inefficient and probably insecure    This is only intended for local   development  and should never be used   in production    Docs  serving static files in developent  EDIT  You could add some urls just to test your 404 and 500 templates  just use the generic view direct to template in your urls   from django views generic simple import direct to template  urlpatterns   patterns            404testing     direct to template    template    404 html

User · Answer

You can debug this in many different ways  Here s my approach   localsettings py   DEBUG   False DEBUG404   True   urls py   from django conf import settings import os  if settings DEBUG404      urlpatterns    patterns              r  static   P lt path gt         django views static serve              document root   os path join os path dirname   file      static               Be sure to read the docs     https   docs djangoproject com en 2 0 howto static-files  limiting-use-to-debug-true

User · Answer

Although it s not safest  but you can change in the source code  navigate to Python 2 7 site-packages django conf urls static py  Then edit like following   if settings DEBUG or  prefix and       in prefix     So then if settings debug  False it won t effect on the code  also after running try python manage py runserver --runserver to run static files   NOTE  Information should only be used for testing only

User · Answer

In urls py I added this line    from django views static import serve    add those two urls in urlpatterns    url r  media   P lt path gt        serve   document root   settings MEDIA ROOT     url r  static   P lt path gt        serve   document root   settings STATIC ROOT       and both static and media files were accesible when DEBUG FALSE  Hope it helps

User · Answer

nginx settings and url configs If you re on linux this may help  nginx file your machn   vim etc nginx sites-available nginxfile server       server name xyz com       location    favicon ico   access log off  log not found off        location  static            root  var www your prj             location  media            root  var www your prj                              urls py                        urlpatterns             path  admin    admin site urls           path  test    test viewset TestServer View as view             path  api private    include router admin urls            path  api public    include router public urls                           if settings DEBUG          import debug toolbar         urlpatterns    static settings MEDIA URL document root settings MEDIA ROOT          urlpatterns    static settings STATIC URL  document root settings STATIC ROOT   settings py                STATIC URL     static   MEDIA URL     media    if DEBUG      STATIC ROOT     var www your prj static       MEDIA ROOT     var www your prj media   else      STATIC ROOT   os path join BASE DIR   static        MEDIA ROOT   os path join BASE DIR   media               Ensure to run   venv yourPrj    manage py collectstatic yourSys  systemctrl daemon-reload

User · Answer

With debug turned off Django won t handle static files for you any more - your production web server  Apache or something  should take care of that

[django] Why does DEBUG=False setting make my django Static Files Access fail?

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