What is Django?

Simply put, Django is one of the best, most used, and well-liked high-level Python web frameworks out there, thanks to its reliability and continuous improvements.

It was designed to save time and provide the infrastructure for creating database-driven sites conveniently and efficiently. Django assists developers in building and maintaining top-quality web applications. The Django development server is a lightweight web server designed for rapid development, but it has limitations for production usage. It is intended only for development environments and features automatic reloading to accommodate frequent code changes during the development phase.

Django supports fast development and clean design. It takes the weight off your shoulders, so you can focus on actual coding instead of trying to reinvent the wheel.

Why Should You Choose Python Django?

Django comes with numerous built-in solutions for common tasks, like creating user authentication, content management, contact forms, file sharing, and much more – meaning you don’t need to write everything from scratch. Understanding foundational programming concepts, specifically highlighting 'data structures' as a crucial component alongside procedural and object-oriented programming basics, is essential before diving into Django.

The framework allows you to manage many modules at the same time to create apps and websites from already existing elements. Therefore, Django speeds up the entire development process significantly.

What Are the Main Features of the Django Framework?

Django is a full-stack framework with many attractive features. Let’s explore some of them.

  • Django offers excellent documentation
  • It has a built-in authentication and URL system
  • It’s a mature and easy-to-use database migration framework
  • Django makes it possible to customize the admin panel to your needs
  • The framework allows you to make each element of the stack independent
  • You can use Django to provide end-to-end app testing

Each Django app is essentially a Python package adhering to specific conventions required by Django.

What Are the Advantages of Django?

Created with web development in mind, Django is highly flexible, allowing developers to replace even crucial parts of the product, such as frontend, as needed. Additionally, integrating Django apps within the context of VPS (Virtual Private Server) services provides developers with the flexibility and control needed for hosting applications built with various frameworks.

You can start creating a web application from the idea phase and have a fully developed product within a couple of days without having to plan for a complete rewrite to achieve your long-term goals.

Here are the key advantages of Django:

  • open source,
  • time-proven,
  • facilitates rapid development,
  • secure,
  • highly adaptable.

Plenty of companies around the world are looking for engineers who have acquired hands-on Django training and know Python very well. As such, it’s no wonder that Django developers are extremely in-demand at the present.

Django can be applied to various modern web application structures. It’s used in production by tech giants like:

  • Instagram,
  • Spotify,
  • Disqus,
  • Pinterest.

Unsurprisingly, a number of beginners and professionals are now looking to learn Django, since the salary packages are quite lucrative, too.

The tutorials and courses we’ll discuss today are designed for developers at any level who want to develop a quality web app with the Django framework.

Setting Up a Django Project

Setting up a Django project involves several steps that help you create a solid foundation for your web application. In this section, we will guide you through the process of creating a project environment for Django, creating a Django project and app, and understanding the Django project structure.

Creating a Project Environment for Django

Before diving into Django development, it’s crucial to set up a project environment. Start by installing Python, pip, and a code editor or IDE of your choice. You can download the latest version of Python from the official Python website. Once Python is installed, you can install pip, the package installer for Python, by running the command python get-pip.py in your command prompt or terminal.

Next, create a virtual environment to isolate your project’s dependencies from the system Python environment. This is done by running the command python -m venv myenv in your command prompt or terminal, replacing myenv with your preferred environment name. Activate the virtual environment with myenv\Scripts\activate on Windows or source myenv/bin/activate on macOS or Linux. This setup ensures that your Django project remains self-contained and manageable.

Creating a Django Project and App

With your project environment ready, you can now create a Django project and app. Begin by running the command django-admin startproject myproject in your command prompt or terminal, substituting myproject with your desired project name. This command generates a new directory named myproject, containing the essential files and directories for a Django project.

To add functionality to your project, create a Django app by running python manage.py startapp myapp, replacing myapp with your app’s name. This command creates a directory named myapp, which includes files like models.py, views.py, and admin.py, each serving a specific purpose in your app’s development.

Understanding the Django Project Structure

The Django project structure is designed to keep your code organized and maintainable. The main project directory (myproject/) contains critical files such as settings.py for configuration, urls.py for URL routing, and wsgi.py for WSGI-compatible web servers.

Within the app directory (myapp/), you’ll find subdirectories like templates/ for HTML templates, static/ for static files like CSS and JavaScript, and migrations/ for database migrations. Understanding this structure helps you navigate and manage your Django projects efficiently, ensuring a smooth development process.

Building a Django Application

Building a Django application involves writing Python code for Django views and URLs. In this section, we will guide you through the process of writing Python code for Django views and URLs.

Writing Python Code for Django Views and URLs

Django views are the backbone of your web application, handling HTTP requests and returning responses. To create a view, define a function in your views.py file that takes an HttpRequest object as an argument and returns an HttpResponse object. For instance, a simple view that returns a “Hello, World!” message looks like this: from django.http import HttpResponse

def hello_world(request): return HttpResponse("Hello, World!") To make this view accessible via a URL, you need to map it in the urls.py file. Define a URL pattern using the path function, which maps the URL to the view function: from django.urls import path from . import views

urlpatterns = [ path('hello/', views.hello_world, name='hello_world'), ] This setup maps the /hello/ URL to the hello_world view, displaying the “Hello, World!” message when accessed.

You can also capture URL parameters and pass them to your views. For example, to capture a username parameter: from django.urls import path from . import views

urlpatterns = [ path('hello/str:username/', views.hello_world, name='hello_world'), ] Modify the view to handle the

Best Django Resources: Free Tutorial Websites

Django Tutorial #1: Getting Started on Django 4.0

This is a tutorial that stands out for actually covering the latest version of Django – 4.0. In fact, you can always count on it including all available versions of Django as it was written by the official Django Software Foundation. That fact alone makes the resource worth checking out, since the foundation promotes and supports the actual progress of the Django web framework.

You'll create a public site that lets people view polls and vote in them, as well as an admin site that lets you add, change, and delete the polls. It's not exactly for complete beginners, though, as you'll have to take care of some initial development environment setup and have at least some grasp of basic Python object programming concepts.

Django Tutorial #2: Django Girls Tutorial

This great resource by Django Girls was created to show people (initially mostly girls) that programming is not that difficult. It was designed for beginners and once you finish it, you'll have a small working web application – your own blog.

This free, introductory tutorial shows you how to write, make work, and put your blog online. What's great is that if you work with the tutorial on your own, they have a chat system, where coaches and previous attendees help you with any problems you might have.

Django Tutorial #3: A Complete Beginner's Guide to Django

This tutorial series on Django is divided into seven parts and focuses on Django fundamentals. It explores in great detail the basic concepts, such as installation and preparation of the development environment, models, views, templates, and URLs.

Although it's a complete beginner's guide to start learning Django, you'll be able to skip the obvious parts and move on to more advanced topics like migrations, testing, and deployment.

What's really interesting, the author, Vitor Freitas, came up with the idea to create comics to read along with the text to illustrate some concepts and scenarios and make the whole learning experience more enjoyable.

Important note: this tutorial was written for an outdated, 1.11 version of Django. With that said, based on the popularity and the positive feedback it's still receiving, we decided it was noteworthy enough to recommend maybe checking it out.

Best Django Resources: Free YouTube Videos and Playlists

Django Tutorial #4: Python Django Tutorial for Beginners‍

In this hour-long video, Mosh Hamedani explains everything you need to know to get started with Django. The video is well-made and very information-dense. Don't be discouraged by the pace of it, since you can treat it as a warmup before digging a bit deeper later on.

This video is obviously free, but if you like learning with Mosh, you can enroll in his full-time course, where every single thing you need to build fast and secure RESTful APIs with Django is taught in one bundle.

Django Tutorial #5: Django Tutorials

This comprehensive, 10-hour tutorial is for medium-to-advanced developers. It consists of 17 videos that will teach you how to build a full-featured Django app from scratch. The playlist includes getting started with Django, using templates, creating databases, uploading pictures, creating authentication systems, and much more.

Corey Schafer explains everything in detail and describes the logic behind the Django design to help you build a working web app. That way, you learn not only how to code, but also understand how Django works. Some videos are only a couple of minutes long, which makes it all easier to digest.

Django Tutorial #6: Python Django Web Framework – Full Course for Beginners

If you prefer to have everything in one place, here's a video that's perfect for you. FreeCodeCamp.org is a global community of millions of people learning to code together, and this is their full Django web framework course for beginners.

It lasts 4 hours and is divided into almost 50 sections. It will be best for programmers in a hurry, as it moves rather quickly from one point to another. The pacing is great, while the tutorial is clear and easy to process.

Best Django Resources: Paid Online Web Development Courses

Django Tutorial #7: Django 3 – Full-Stack Websites with Python Web Development

This is one of the best online courses on Django 3. Nick Walter, one of the most popular and highly praised instructors on Udemy, teaches you how to create three websites using HTML5, CSS3, and Bootstrap 4 for the frontend, and Python and Django for the backend.

It'll be great for both beginners and a bit more advanced Python developers.

Duration: 8.5 hour

Cost: $10–67, depending on the offer

Django Tutorial #8: Build a Backend REST API with Python & Django – Advanced

If you’re looking for an advanced course on Python, Django, and web development, the one created by Mark Winterbottom and Brooke Rutherford is perfect for you. Django facilitates the creation and management of complex web applications through features like template inheritance, database integration, and a streamlined workflow for developing and deploying web apps.

This course is great for anyone who wants to become a full-stack Python developer, as you will learn to build a REST API with Python and Django as well as Docker, and how to use test-driven development (TDD) for building quality software and completing projects on time.

Duration: 8 hours

Cost: $16–29, depending on the offer

Django Tutorial #9: Django 2.2 & Python | The Ultimate Web Development Bootcamp

In this course by Nick Walter, you will learn by building three websites from scratch. You will code both the frontend and backend, and publish your site online with Digital Ocean, one of the most popular cloud providers among developers.

Additionally, throughout the course, Nick shows the process of fixing any unexpected errors that you may encounter in the development process.

Duration: 10 hours

Cost: $16–123, depending on the offer

Django Tutorial #10: Python Django Dev to Deployment

This Python and Django course created by Brad Traversy offers more than 11 hours of videos and exercises. You'll learn how to use Python, build a website with Django and PostgreSQL, create a virtual environment, and deploy the web app. It's dedicated to beginners, but more advanced programmers will find it useful, too.

Cost: $17–74, depending on the offer

Django Tutorial #11: Django: Getting Started

In this Pluralsight Django course for complete beginners by Reindert-Jan Ekker, you will learn the basics of web development with the Django framework. It will teach you how to create pages using Django templates, add URL mappings for these pages, handle user interaction with forms, and how to store and manipulate data.

After finishing the course, you'll have a good overview of all the essential parts of Django and how they work together so that you can go on and build your own websites.

Duration: 2.5 hour

Cost: Pluralsight is a platform that works on monthly subscriptions. For $29 per month or $299 per year, you can get access to their 7,000+ online courses created by experts on the latest technology. You can also use their 10-day-free-pass to watch this course for free.

Django Tutorial #12: Python and Django Full-Stack Web Developer Bootcamp

This is one of the most popular Django courses on Udemy. It was created by Jose Portilla, who follows a bootcamp style of teaching, which is great to learn new skills like Django.

The course will teach you not just Django, but also other related technologies like HTML, CSS, Bootstrap, JavaScript, jQuery, and Python 3 required for full-stack web development. You'll understand HTTP requests, create landing pages, and finally create a fully functional website.

It is also the longest course on this list – it lasts 32 hours and is both for complete beginners, professionals looking to bridge gaps in their knowledge, and Python developers looking to get into web development.

Important note: this course was also written for an outdated, 1.11 version of Django. However, based on the positive comments it's still receiving, we decided it was a worthy resource for learning.

Cost: $17–123, depending on the offer

Bonus Django Resource: Ebook

Django Tutorial #13: Tango with Django 2

Last but not least, there is an ebook on our list.

It's highly recommended and popular among developers, as it's being revised and updated depending on the latest versions of Django and Python. The first edition was launched in 2013 by Dr. Leif Azzopardi and Dr. David Maxwell, web development professors at the University of Glasgow.

The latest version costs $20, but previous editions of the book are available for free here.

According to the authors, “In this edition, you will learn how to build web applications using Django by building a simple app called Rango, a directory of categories and links. Through the process, you'll learn how to set up your Django projects, create models, views, and mappings, as well as user authentication, templates, class-based views, and testing.”

A great resource, no matter the skill level.

Final Thoughts

Thank you for reading our article on the best Django and Django REST tutorials in 2022. We hope it'll help you decide which one fits your needs best and get you started.

Since 2005, STX Next has been constantly growing to become one of the largest Python software houses in the world with over 200 Python developers on board and over 320 completed Django projects so far

We never cease to look for enthusiastic, talented developers who live and breathe Python. If you're interested in working with us, check out our current job opportunities.

If you enjoyed this article and would like to learn more about Django or Python, we have other free resources you might find interesting, such as:

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