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Writing More Views

View Function

A view function/class, or view for short, is a Python function that takes a web request and returns a web response.

from django.http import HttpResponse


def index(request):
   return HttpResponse("<h1>Welcome to my homepage!</h1>")

HttpResponse

HttpResponse is used to provide an inbound HTTP request to a Django web application with a text response.

HttpResponse("Response here")

urls.py

URL routes are configured in urls.py by calling the path() function to the urlpatterns list.

urlpatterns = [
  path(""home/"", home_view),
  path(""about/"", about_me_view),
]

Dynamic URLs

Dynamic URLs can be created by using angle brackets (<, >) to capture named parameters inside of a path() function. 

# URLconfig
urlpatterns = [
  path("profile/<str:name>", profile_view),
]


# views.py
def profile_view(request, name):
  return HttpResponse(f"Hey there! My name is {name}")

render() Function

The render() functions take three arguments- the request variable, the template path, and optionally a dictionary object to pass data to the template.

render(request, "template.html", { "data": your_data })

404 Exception

An Http404 exception can be raised inside a view function and returns a built-in 404 page provided by Django.

from django.http import Http404


def blog_view(request, slug):
  try:
    entry = Blog.objects.get(slug=slug)
  except Blog.DoesNotExist:
    raise Http404()
  return render(request, "blog/post.html", {"blog": entry})

Dynamic URLs in Templates

The name parameter can be provided inside the path() function in order to dynamically render it within the route’s template. The route will be accessible via the named parameter that’s passed on.

<a href="{% url 'name_of_path' %}">Contact Me</a>

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