Django is a high-level Python Web framework that provides a clean and pragmatic design for rapid development and clean code. It comes with a lightweight and standalone web server for development and testing. By default, Django uses SQLite as a database, but you can change the database settings to work with MySQL, PostgreSQL, or Oracle. This piece will focus on using Django with MySQL (Python Central, 2021).
Before you begin, you need to make sure you have MySQL installed and the Django MySQL driver, mysqlclient. If not, you can install them using pip: `pip install mysqlclient`.
To configure Django to use MySQL, you will start by creating a new Django project or using an existing one. Django’s settings.py file is the configuration heart of the Django project, which is located within the project directory (Stack Overflow, 2012).
In your settings.py file, make a change under the DATABASES = {} dictionary. Replace the SQLite configuration with the new MySQL configuration. The new configuration should include the ‘ENGINE’ which should be django.db.backends.mysql, the ‘NAME’ which is the name of your MySQL database, ‘USER’ and ‘PASSWORD’ which are your MySQL credentials, and HOST and PORT which are the details of where your database is hosted (Dennis Ivy on YouTube, 2019).
Here is a sample configuration:
```
DATABASES = {
‘default’: {
‘ENGINE’: ‘django.db.backends.mysql’,
‘NAME’: ‘mydatabase’,
‘USER’: ‘mydatabaseuser’,
‘PASSWORD’: ‘mypassword’,
‘HOST’: ‘localhost’,
‘PORT’: ‘3306’,
}
}
```
After making changes in your settings.py file, run your Django application. If configured correctly, Django will now use MySQL as the database.
Remember to apply your current schema to the newly created database by running `python manage.py makemigrations` and `python manage.py migrate` in the console. These commands help create database tables for installed apps that don’t yet have them and apply database schema changes (Django Documentation, 2021).
In a nutshell, Django allows you to freely change the database you wish to use, and using it with MySQL is achieved by adjusting a few configuration parameters in your Django project’s settings file.
Here are the sources used:
1. Python Central, 2021. Django Database Setup. Available at: https://www.pythoncentral.io/django-database-setup/
2. Dennis Ivy on YouTube, 2019. Django Database Tutorial. Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHC3uTkT9r8
3. Django Documentation, 2021. Django’s database API. Available at: https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/3.2/topics/db/
4. Stack Overflow, 2012. How to change the Django database to MySQL. Available at: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/19189813/setting-django-up-to-use-mysql
