Errors 404 and 500 while access static files in Django

Question

I tried to use static files in Django. When I access files directly (by ../static/1.txt), it gives me Error 404 or Error 500 (depends on what Stackoverflow answer I follow) The code in the Settings.py is the following:

# Django settings for mysite project.

DEBUG = True
TEMPLATE_DEBUG = DEBUG

ADMINS = (
    # ('Your Name', 'your_email@example.com'),
)

MANAGERS = ADMINS

DATABASES = {
    'default': {
        'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.', # Add 'postgresql_psycopg2', 'mysql', 'sqlite3' or 'oracle'.
        'NAME': '',                      # Or path to database file if using sqlite3.
        # The following settings are not used with sqlite3:
        'USER': '',
        'PASSWORD': '',
        'HOST': '',                      # Empty for localhost through domain sockets or '127.0.0.1' for localhost through TCP.
        'PORT': '',                      # Set to empty string for default.
    }
}

# Hosts/domain names that are valid for this site; required if DEBUG is False
# See https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/1.5/ref/settings/#allowed-hosts
ALLOWED_HOSTS = []

# Local time zone for this installation. Choices can be found here:
# http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tz_zones_by_name
# although not all choices may be available on all operating systems.
# In a Windows environment this must be set to your system time zone.
TIME_ZONE = 'America/Chicago'

# Language code for this installation. All choices can be found here:
# http://www.i18nguy.com/unicode/language-identifiers.html
LANGUAGE_CODE = 'en-us'

SITE_ID = 1

# If you set this to False, Django will make some optimizations so as not
# to load the internationalization machinery.
USE_I18N = True

# If you set this to False, Django will not format dates, numbers and
# calendars according to the current locale.
USE_L10N = True

# If you set this to False, Django will not use timezone-aware datetimes.
USE_TZ = True

# Absolute filesystem path to the directory that will hold user-uploaded files.
# Example: "/var/www/example.com/media/"
MEDIA_ROOT = ''

# URL that handles the media served from MEDIA_ROOT. Make sure to use a
# trailing slash.
# Examples: "http://example.com/media/", "http://media.example.com/"
MEDIA_URL = ''

# Absolute path to the directory static files should be collected to.
# Don't put anything in this directory yourself; store your static files
# in apps' "static/" subdirectories and in STATICFILES_DIRS.
# Example: "/var/www/example.com/static/"


import os
settings_dir = os.path.dirname(__file__)
PROJECT_ROOT = os.path.abspath(os.path.dirname(settings_dir))

PROJECT_ROOT = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))


STATIC_ROOT = ''

# URL prefix for static files.
# Example: "http://example.com/static/", "http://static.example.com/"
STATIC_URL = 'C:/Python27/Lib/site-packages/django/mysite/mysite/static/'

# Additional locations of static files
STATICFILES_DIRS = (
    # Put strings here, like "/home/html/static" or "C:/www/django/static".
    # Always use forward slashes, even on Windows.
    # Don't forget to use absolute paths, not relative paths.
#    "C:/Python27/Lib/site-packages/django/mysite/mysite/static",     
    os.path.join(PROJECT_ROOT, 'static/mysite/'),
    PROJECT_ROOT + '/static/'
)

# List of finder classes that know how to find static files in
# various locations.
STATICFILES_FINDERS = (
    'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.FileSystemFinder',
    'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.AppDirectoriesFinder',
#    'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.DefaultStorageFinder',
)

# Make this unique, and don't share it with anybody.
SECRET_KEY = '***'

# List of callables that know how to import templates from various sources.
TEMPLATE_LOADERS = (
    'django.template.loaders.filesystem.Loader',
    'django.template.loaders.app_directories.Loader',
#     'django.template.loaders.eggs.Loader',
)

MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES = (
    'django.middleware.common.CommonMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.sessions.middleware.SessionMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.csrf.CsrfViewMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.auth.middleware.AuthenticationMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.messages.middleware.MessageMiddleware',
    # Uncomment the next line for simple clickjacking protection:
    # 'django.middleware.clickjacking.XFrameOptionsMiddleware',
)

ROOT_URLCONF = 'mysite.urls'

# Python dotted path to the WSGI application used by Django's runserver.
WSGI_APPLICATION = 'mysite.wsgi.application'

import os.path

TEMPLATE_DIRS = (
    # Put strings here, like "/home/html/django_templates" or "C:/www/django/templates".
    # Always use forward slashes, even on Windows.
    # Don't forget to use absolute paths, not relative paths.
    os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__), 'templates/mysite').replace('\\','/'),
)

INSTALLED_APPS = (
    'django.contrib.auth',
    'django.contrib.contenttypes',
    'django.contrib.sessions',
    'django.contrib.sites',
    'django.contrib.messages',
    'django.contrib.staticfiles',
    # Uncomment the next line to enable the admin:
    # 'django.contrib.admin',
    # Uncomment the next line to enable admin documentation:
    # 'django.contrib.admindocs',
)

# A sample logging configuration. The only tangible logging
# performed by this configuration is to send an email to
# the site admins on every HTTP 500 error when DEBUG=False.
# See http://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/topics/logging for
# more details on how to customize your logging configuration.
LOGGING = {
    'version': 1,
    'disable_existing_loggers': False,
    'filters': {
        'require_debug_false': {
            '()': 'django.utils.log.RequireDebugFalse'
        }
    },
    'handlers': {
        'mail_admins': {
            'level': 'ERROR',
            'filters': ['require_debug_false'],
            'class': 'django.utils.log.AdminEmailHandler'
        }
    },
    'loggers': {
        'django.request': {
            'handlers': ['mail_admins'],
            'level': 'ERROR',
            'propagate': True,
        },
    }
}

What's wrong with this settings file? Why can't I access static files in my directory "static/mysite"?

And here is the link to the source code of the app I think that I may be missing something very simple...

Answer 1

In your settings.py, define the STATIC_ and MEDIA_ values:

# Absolute filesystem path to the directory that will hold user-uploaded files.
# Example: "/home/media/media.lawrence.com/media/"
MEDIA_ROOT = '/path/to/mydjangosite/media/'

# URL that handles the media served from MEDIA_ROOT. Make sure to use a
# trailing slash.
# Examples: "http://media.lawrence.com/media/", "http://example.com/media/"
MEDIA_URL = 'http://www.mydjangosite.com/media/'

# Absolute path to the directory static files should be collected to.
# Don't put anything in this directory yourself; store your static files
# in apps' "static/" subdirectories and in STATICFILES_DIRS.
# Example: "/home/media/media.lawrence.com/static/"
STATIC_ROOT = '/path/to/mydjangosite/static/'

# URL prefix for static files.
# Example: "http://media.lawrence.com/static/"
STATIC_URL = 'http://www.mydjangosite.com/static/'

Also, ensure that the correct STATICFILES_FINDERS are configured:

# List of finder classes that know how to find static files in
# various locations.
STATICFILES_FINDERS = (
    'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.FileSystemFinder',
    'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.AppDirectoriesFinder',
#    'django.contrib.staticfiles.finders.DefaultStorageFinder',
)

The AppDirectoriesFinder must be enabled to collect static files from the static/ sub-directory within each app. Additionally, ensure that your apps are included in the INSTALLED_APPS setting or else the AppDirectoriesFinder won't know where to look for static files:

INSTALLED_APPS = (
    'django.contrib.auth',
    'django.contrib.contenttypes',
    'django.contrib.sessions',
    'django.contrib.sites',
    'django.contrib.messages',
    'django.contrib.staticfiles',
    'django.contrib.humanize',
    # Uncomment the next line to enable the admin:
    'django.contrib.admin',
    # Uncomment the next line to enable admin documentation:
    # 'django.contrib.admindocs',
    # DJANGO SOUTH
    'south',
    # MY APPS
    'my_django_app',
)

---

Then, to collect static from the various app folders (e.g. my_project/my_app/static) you must invoke the manage.py command collectstatic:

python manage.py collectstatic

This moves all the various apps' static files into the folder specified by STATIC_ROOT in settings.py.

---

Finally, ensure that your static folder is served directly by your web server and not via the Django WSGI application. For Apache2 /etc/apache2/sites-available/my_django_site.conf:

<VirtualHost *:80>
      ServerName www.mydjangosite.com
      ServerAlias mydjangosite.com
      ServerAdmin fake@mydjangosite.com

      DocumentRoot /path/to/mydjangosite
      <Directory /path/to/mydjangosite>
             Options FollowSymLinks
             AllowOverride None
             Order allow,deny
             allow from all
      </Directory>

      Alias /static/ /path/to/mydjangosite/static/
      <Directory /path/to/mydjangosite/static>
              Order allow,deny
              allow from all
      </Directory>

      Alias /media/ /path/to/mydjangosite/media/
      <Directory /path/to/mydjangosite/media>
              Order allow,deny
              allow from all
      </Directory>

      # The following installs the Django WSGI app
      WSGIDaemonProcess www.mydjangosite.com processes=2 threads=15 display-name=%{GROUP}
      WSGIProcessGroup www.mydjangosite.com
      WSGIScriptAlias / /path/to/mydjangosite/wsgi.py

</VirtualHost>

An explicit Alias definition and a Directory tag for the alias'd directory will override any WSGI application running in a higher-level parent directory.

---

Execute sudo service apache2 restart to load the new site.conf configuration.

Answer 2

Staticfiles in Django is one of the more confusing parts of the framework in my opinion. Django expects you to put static files into a folder that will be served locally during development, but collected to another directory, along with any other static media 3rd party app modules might be using, in production as a result of running manage.py collectstatic

Here is the directory structure that I use, and a helper function to make life a little easier in regards to static files...

# A Sample Project structure

/sample_app
    manage.py
    /sample_app

    # this directory is served by the 'staticfiles' app during development
    # as specified by STATICFILES_DIRS for the location of the files
    # and a STATIC_URL of '/static/'
    /static-assets/
        /css
        /js
        /images

    # this directory is where all of the folders and files specified in the
    # STATICFILES_DIRS setting get collected to for deployment. The files
    # will be collected to the directory specified by the STATIC_ROOT setting.
    /static


# settings.py

import os

# a helper function to return absolute paths, using settings.py
# as a starting point. This assumes Django >= 1.4.x
def map_path(directory_name):
    return os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__),
        '../' + directory_name).replace('\\', '/')

MEDIA_ROOT = map_path('static/uploads/')
MEDIA_URL = '/static/uploads/'

STATIC_ROOT = map_path('static')
STATIC_URL = '/static/'

STATICFILES_DIRS = (
    map_path('static-assets'),
)

# You can also use map_path for other paths, like templates
TEMPLATE_DIRS = (
    map_path('templates),
)

TEMPLATE_CONTEXT_PROCESSORS = (
    ...
    'django.core.context_processors.request',
    'django.core.context_processors.static'
    ...
)

Then you should be able to reference static files in your templates as:

<link type="text/css" rel="stylesheet"
    href="{{ STATIC_URL }}css/base.css" media="screen,projection" />

Another potential gotcha is that the staticfiles app only works when DEBUG = True