Installing Django on OS X Leopard

If you haven’t already, stick your Leopard disk in and install Xcode 3.0.

Make a home for Django:

sudo mkdir /usr/local/django
cd /usr/local/django

Get the Django trunk from Subversion:

sudo svn co http://code.djangoproject.com/svn/django/trunk/

The Django trunk should now be in /usr/local/django/trunk/, and if you ever want to check out another branch, you have a nice spot to put it next to the trunk.

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If you’ve previously install Python yourself, pay attention here

Find out if you’re using the right version of Python:

which python

If you don’t see:

/usr/bin/python

then delete whatever version you have sitting in your path, such as one in /usr/local/:

sudo rm /usr/local/bin/python

Once “which python” gives you “/usr/bin/python“, make sure your Python site-packages is in the right place. Running this command:

python -c "from distutils.sysconfig import get_python_lib; print get_python_lib()"

should give you:

/Library/Python/2.5/site-packages

End of previous Python caveat

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Now make sure Python knows where to find Django:

ln -s /usr/local/django/trunk/django /Library/Python/2.5/site-packages/django

Put the django-admin.py script on your system path:

sudo ln -s /usr/local/django/trunk/django/bin/django-admin.py /usr/local/bin/

Now you should have Django installed and ready to go. Run:

django-admin.py startproject project_name

and see.

If it works, cd into the folder it creates and try:

python manage.py runserver

Then go to localhost:8000 in your browser.

Django + MySQL:

If you want to use MySQL with Django, there’s a bit more to do. If you have MySQL ready to go, continue. Otherwise, go talk with Dan for a bit and come back here when you’re done.

Download the MySQLdb package. Stick in in /usr/local/src if you’re cool. Open it and edit site.cfg.

Change line ~ 13 from:

#mysql_config = /usr/local/bin/mysql_config

To:

mysql_config = /usr/local/mysql/bin/mysql_config

In _mysql.c:

Remove these lines (~ 37-39):

#ifndef uint 
#define uint unsigned int 
#endif

Go to the folder on the command line, then:

sudo python setup.py build
sudo python setup.py install

You might have to run the build command more than once. Don’t ask me why–I’m a copy and paster just like you.

That should do it. Try editing your settings.py file in your Django project and entering information for a MySQL database and see if it works.

If you experience something different than this or have any problems, please let me know directly or leave a comment.

Sources

• Django documentation
• The Django Book
• Installing Django for Leopard with MySQL Support
• #django IRC group