Debugging is a crucial part of any application development process, and it’s no different with Django. To enable debugging in Django, you need to adjust your settings.py file, which is your central configuration for the Django project. The primary setting to be adjusted is the DEBUG setting.
The DEBUG is a boolean that turns on/off the debugging mode in Django. When it’s set to True, the Django will display detailed error pages with much information such as traceback, which middleware and view was used, SQL queries, headers, etc. If it’s set to False, then Django will handle any request that goes wrong by calling a specific view. This setting is handy in a production environment.
In settings.py, you would have something that looks like this:
```
DEBUG = True
```
This setting literally turns on debug mode in Django, but it should be used cautiously. You should only set DEBUG = True when you are debugging or during development. Once your app is ready for production, you should set DEBUG = False for security reasons.
Apart from adjusting the DEBUG setting, Django has tools for debugging your application. The Django Debug Toolbar is an easily configurable set of panels displaying various debug information about the current request/response. You can install it via pip:
```
pip install django-debug-toolbar
```
Then, add it to your installed apps and middleware in your settings.py:
```
INSTALLED_APPS = [
…,
‘debug_toolbar’,
]
MIDDLEWARE = [
…,
‘debug_toolbar.middleware.DebugToolbarMiddleware’,
]
```
Next, set the internal IPs in your settings.py. The toolbar will only be shown for users accessing the application from an IP listed in INTERNAL\_IPS.
```
INTERNAL_IPS = [‘127.0.0.1’]
```
Django also provides a logging framework that lets you specify which activities are logged and at what level. You can configure this in your settings.py:
```
LOGGING = {
…
‘loggers’: {
‘django’: {
‘handlers’: [‘file’],
‘level’: ‘DEBUG’,
},
},
}
```
Keep in mind that while Django’s built-in tools can assist with debugging, complex issues may require additional tools or approaches.
Sources:
- Django for Professionals by William S. Vincent
- Django for Beginners by William S. Vincent
- Two Scoops of Django by Daniel Greenfeld and Audrey Roy
- The Official Django Documentation.
