[python] What is the path that Django uses for locating and loading templates?

I'm following this tutorial on a Windows 7 environment.

My settings file has this definition:

TEMPLATE_DIRS = (
    'C:/django-project/myapp/mytemplates/admin'
)

I got the base_template from the template admin/base_site.html from within the default Django admin template directory in the source code of Django itself (django/contrib/admin/templates) into an admin subdirectory of myapp directory as the tutorial instructed, but it doesn't seem to take affect for some reason.

Any clue of what might be the problem?

This question is related to python django django-templates

The answer is


In django 2.2 this is explained here

https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/2.2/howto/overriding-templates/

import os

BASE_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)))

INSTALLED_APPS = [
    ...,
    'blog',
    ...,
]

TEMPLATES = [
    {
        'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
        'DIRS': [os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'templates')],
        'APP_DIRS': True,
        ...
    },
]

basically BASE_DIR is your django project directory, same dir where manage.py is.

    TEMPLATES = [
        {
            'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
            'DIRS': [os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'templates')],
            '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',
                ],
            },
        },
    ]


Smart solution in Django 2.0.3 for keeping templates in project directory (/root/templates/app_name):

settings.py

BASE_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)))
TEMP_DIR = os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'templates')
...
TEMPLATES = [
{
    'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
    'DIRS': [TEMP_DIR],
...

in views.py just add such template path:

app_name/html_name

Contrary to some answers posted in this thread, adding 'DIRS': ['templates'] has no effect(it's redundant) since templates is the default path where Django looks for templates.

If you are attempting to reference an app's template, ensure that your app is in the list of INSTALLED_APPS in the main project settings.py.

INSTALLED_APPS': [
   # ...
   'my_app',
]

Quoting Django's Templates documentation:

class DjangoTemplates¶

Set BACKEND to 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates' to configure a Django template engine.

When APP_DIRS is True, DjangoTemplates engines look for templates in the templates subdirectory of installed applications. This generic name was kept for backwards-compatibility.

When you create an application to your project, there's no templates directory inside the application directory. Since that you can have an application without using templates, Django doesn't create such directory. That is, you have to create it and storing your templates in there.

Here's another paragraph from Django Tutorial documentation, which is even clearer:

Your project’s TEMPLATES setting describes how Django will load and render templates. The default settings file configures a DjangoTemplates backend whose APP_DIRS option is set to True. By convention DjangoTemplates looks for a “templates” subdirectory in each of the INSTALLED_APPS.


If using Django settings as installed, then why not just use its baked-in, predefined BASE_DIR and TEMPLATES? In the pip installed Django(v1.8), I get:

BASE_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))) 


TEMPLATES = [
    {
        'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
        'DIRS': [
            ### ADD YOUR DIRECTORY HERE LIKE SO:
            BASE_DIR + '/templates/',
        ],
        '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',
            ],
        },
    },
]

Alright Let's say you have a brand new project, if so you would go to settings.py file and search for TEMPLATES once you found it you just paste this line os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'template') in 'DIRS' At the end, you should get somethings like this :

TEMPLATES = [
    {
        'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
        'DIRS': [
            os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'template')
        ],
        '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',
            ],
        },
    },
]

If you want to know where your BASE_DIR directory is located type these 3 simple commands:

python3 manage.py shell

Once you're in the shell :

>>> from django.conf import settings
>>> settings.BASE_DIR

PS: If you named your template folder with another name, you would change it here too.


For Django 1.6.6:

BASE_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(__file__))
TEMPLATE_DIRS = os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'templates')

Also static and media for debug and production mode:

STATIC_URL = '/static/'
MEDIA_URL = '/media/'
if DEBUG:
    STATIC_ROOT = os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'static')
    MEDIA_ROOT = os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'media')
else:
    STATIC_ROOT = %REAL_PATH_TO_PRODUCTION_STATIC_FOLDER%
    MEDIA_ROOT = %REAL_PATH_TO_PRODUCTION_MEDIA_FOLDER%

Into urls.py you must add:

from django.conf.urls import patterns, include, url
from django.contrib import admin
from django.conf.urls.static import static
from django.conf import settings

from news.views import Index

admin.autodiscover()

urlpatterns = patterns('',
    url(r'^admin/', include(admin.site.urls)),
    ...
    )

urlpatterns += static(settings.STATIC_URL, document_root=settings.STATIC_ROOT)

In Django 1.8 you can set template paths, backend and other parameters for templates in one dictionary (settings.py):

TEMPLATES = [
    {
        'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
        'DIRS': [
            path.join(BASE_DIR, 'templates')
        ],
        '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',
            ],
        },
    },
]

Official docs.


I also had issues with this part of the tutorial (used tutorial for version 1.7).

My mistake was that I only edited the 'Django administration' string, and did not pay enough attention to the manual.

This is the line from django/contrib/admin/templates/admin/base_site.html:

<h1 id="site-name"><a href="{% url 'admin:index' %}">{{ site_header|default:_('Django administration') }}</a></h1>

But after some time and frustration it became clear that there was the 'site_header or default:_' statement, which should be removed. So after removing the statement (like the example in the manual everything worked like expected).

Example manual:

<h1 id="site-name"><a href="{% url 'admin:index' %}">Polls Administration</a></h1>

In django 3.1, go to setting of your project and import os

TEMPLATES = [
    {
        'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
        'DIRS': [os.path.join(BASE_DIR, "templates")],
        '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',
            ],
        },
    },
]

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