I’m writing a Django book¶

A month ago I wrote that my book proposal had been accepted. I’m now all set up to start writing and… my temporary title is solid Django.

Yes, I’m writing a full-length book about Django for the pragmatic bookshelf!

Of course I only wrote one sample chapter and a preliminary table of contents yet, but here’s what I can say already to give you (and myself!) a feel for it:

Let’s say you are my new colleague. Solid Django is the book I’d like you to read. You can program, but you might or might not have Django experience. Perhaps you come from a Java background with some personal side projects in Python? Solid Django ought to get you up to speed quickly.

You know Django? Up to speed? Learn how to give your projects a solid structure with proper python packaging. A solid foundation with tests. Modern Django, too, with easy logging setup in your settings.py and those fancy new wonderful class based views. “Solid” also means “security”, so permissions. And I won’t forget object-based permissions.

You know Django very well? I aim solid Django to be broad. I’d rather cover context processors, management commands and database routers than list all the available form widget types. The Django website is best for that latter list, the former concepts are best described in my book. You ought to get a broad overview over Django so that you don’t miss out on some technique that you don’t yet know about.

I work in a Django team of about 10 people, so we discover lots of common problem areas. I often try to find and discover ways to prevent those problems: ways of working that are more robust, practices that prevent common errors. Solid Django.

So…. Pipe up if you’ve got ideas for me! What should I write about? Topics to cover? Suggestions? I’m basically writing this book for you, so you’ll get some input :-)