Django, a high-level Python web framework, allows applications to be developed rapidly with clean and pragmatic design. It provides versatile features including a standalone web server for development, caching, middleware system, ORM, template engine and more. One of them is logging which indeed is a powerful tool for debugging and auditing purposes.
Logging can be configured in Django through the settings.py file within your Django project.
Here are the basics of Django logging configuration:
1. Import modules: First, you need to import the necessary modules in your settings.py file.
```
import os
import logging.config
```
1. Define LOGGING variable: The next step is to define a LOGGING variable (dictionary) in the settings.py file.
```
LOGGING = {
‘version’: 1,
‘disable_existing_loggers’: False,
‘handlers’: {
‘file’: {
‘level’: ‘DEBUG’,
‘class’: ‘logging.FileHandler’,
‘filename’: os.path.join(BASE_DIR, ‘debug.log’),
},
},
‘root’: {
‘handlers’: [‘file’],
‘level’: ‘DEBUG’,
},
}
```
In this example, ‘debug.log’ file will be located in the base directory of your Django project. All ‘DEBUG’ level (and above) logs will be captured in this file.
1. Configure loggers in your app: Finally, you use the Python standard logging library in the Django app, which you’ve already set up in the Django logging configuration above.
```
import logging
logger = logging.getLogger(name)
def my_view(request, arg1, arg):
…
if bad_mojo:
logger.error(‘Something went wrong!’)
```
In this example, every time the “bad\_mojo” condition is met, an error message ‘Something went wrong!’ is logged to our ‘debug.log’.
The logging module lets you specify which level of log message you want to handle (DEBUG, INFO, WARNING, ERROR, CRITICAL), with DEBUG being the lowest severity level and CRITICAL being the highest.
The official Django documentation provides a comprehensive overview of configuring logging (https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/topics/logging/). Alternatively, you could review the Python documentation on logging (https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html) to make more complex logging setups like simultaneous logging to a file and console, rotating log files, and sending error emails.
Python logging is a powerful tool for debugging when you get past the basics. While logging doesn’t exclude the use of advanced debugging tools, it can provide a more valuable perspective of how your application is performing.
