Change model object url in django admin list using template overriding

Question

Suppose I have a model of Category, and it has been declared in admin.py.

There are two things that I want to do using Django template overriding.

• Add a button on the right near "Add Category +" which is visible only on the Category List page and takes me to another URL.
• Overriding URLs of Category object so that clicking on each individual category on the list takes to the respective URLs

# models.py

class Category(models.Model):
    name = models.CharField(max_length=50, null=True, blank=False)
    LANGUAGE_ENGLISH = 'en'
    LANGUAGE_FRENCH = 'fr'

    LANGUAGES = ((LANGUAGE_ENGLISH, 'English'),(LANGUAGE_FRENCH, 'French'),)

    language = models.CharField(max_length=12, default=LANGUAGE_ENGLISH, choices=LANGUAGES, blank=False)
    created_at = models.DateTimeField(auto_now_add=True)

# admin.py

@admin.register(Category)
class CategoryAdmin(admin.ModelAdmin):
    list_display = ('name', 'language', 'created_at')
    list_filter = ('created_at', 'language')
    search_fields = ('name',)
    date_hierarchy = 'created_at'
    ordering = ['-created_at']

Category in the admin panel Here, clicking on Lifestyle or Travel should take me to two external urls.

Answer 1

First solution:

override list_display_links and change your field manually

It's a two steps process. First, we need to change get_list_display_links default behavior.

Looking at django's doc and source you will realize it will end up using first item in list_display. In your admin class:

@admin.register(Category)
class CategoryAdmin(admin.ModelAdmin):
    list_display = ('name', 'language', 'created_at')
    list_filter = ('created_at', 'language')
    list_display_links = [] #< With this, you still can add up a link to your original admin
    search_fields = ('name',)
    date_hierarchy = 'created_at'
    ordering = ['-created_at']

    def get_list_display_links(self, request, list_display):
        """
        Return a sequence containing the fields to be displayed as links
        on the changelist. The list_display parameter is the list of fields
        returned by get_list_display().
        """
        if self.list_display_links or self.list_display_links is None or not list_display:
            # We make sure you still add your admin's links if you explicitly declare `list_display_links`
            return self.list_display_links 
        else:
            # We return empty list instead of `list_display[:1]`
            # if no `list_display_links` is provided.
            return []

Then using this answer, you can make any column customized.

Second solution:

Handle change view yourself

In your admin class:

@admin.register(Category)
class CategoryAdmin(admin.ModelAdmin):
   #... same things as you have

   def change_view(self, request, object_id, form_url="", extra_context=None):
       #Now, you can do pretty much whatever: it's a function based view!

I'd recommend the first one as I believe default admin's change_view is always usefull.