Django not recognizing files deleted/added

Question

I have the following function that gives me the list of files(complete path) in a given list of directories:

from os import walk
from os.path import join

# Returns a list of all the files in the list of directories passed
def get_files(directories = get_template_directories()):
    files = []
    for directory in directories:
        for dir, dirnames, filenames in walk(directory):
            for filename in filenames:
                file_name = join(dir, filename)
                files.append(file_name)
    return files

I'am adding some files to the template directories in Django. But this function always return the same list of files even though some are added/deleted in the run time. These changes are reflected only when I do a server restart. Is that because of some caching that os.walk() performs or is it required that we need to restart the server after adding/removing some files ?

I'am adding/deleting some template files in django from my Django Applications. @JerinPeterGeorge — deltaforce, Jul 26 '18 at 07:05
I can see these changes in my file explorer. But not getting reflected in my Django app — deltaforce, Jul 26 '18 at 07:09

score 2 · Accepted Answer · edited Jul 26 '18 at 09:16

It is not django problem, your behaviour is result of python interpreter specific:

Default arguments may be provided as plain values or as the result of a function call, but this latter technique need a very big warning. Default values evaluated once at start application and never else.

I' m sure this code will solve your problem:

def get_files(directories = None):
    if not directories:
        directories = get_template_directories()
    files = []
    for directory in directories:
        for dir, dirnames, filenames in walk(directory):
            for filename in filenames:
                file_name = join(dir, filename)
                files.append(file_name)
    return files

You can find same questions on Stackoverflow Default Values for function parameters in Python

I never knew about this. I'am relatively new to python and lacks a strong base. Thanks a lot...@PavelMinenkov — deltaforce, Jul 26 '18 at 09:04

Django not recognizing files deleted/added

1 Answers1