by dan 10/05/06 12:00:00 Article django.

Using markup makes it less painful to enter texts in web. Django includes three markup filters to use: textile, markdown, and reST (restructured text). I use reST a lot because it has lots of features that I couldn't live without (like toc directive) and because it has the blessing of python.

reST on Django

Installation of docutils on Linux

To be able to use reST, install docutils on your server. On Debian based Linux:

shell>sudo apt-get install python-docutils

Installing docutils on Dreamhost

On Dreamhost, it is more complicated since users don't have root access. Ssh into dreamhost. In Windows, use Putty. In Linux, go into shell. My server resides in compton, so I ssh into compton.dreamhost.com. Your account may reside on different servers, so don't use 'compton' unless that is the name of your server.

local>ssh myaccount@compton.dreamhost.com

Download the latest docutils source code

host>wget http://docutils.sf.net/docutils-snapshot.tgz

Unpack

host> tar zxvf docutils-snapshot.tgz
host> cd docutils-snapshot.tgz

Install it to a local directory

host> ./setup.py install --prefix=~/tmp

Copy or move the built docutils package into the same path as PYTHONPATH. If you are using the same path as the one given in the dreamhost's wiki instruction, pythonpath will be ~/django_source/. Also I'm using python2.4 but dreamhost has python 2.3 by default. If you're running 2.3, path may not be the same.

host> mv ~/tmp/lib/python2.4/site-packages/docutils \
~/django_source
host> pkill python

Add "django.contrib.markup" in your INSTALLED_APPS in settings.py

 # it looks like this in my settings.py
 INSTALLED_APPS = (
    'django.contrib.auth',
    'django.contrib.contenttypes',
    'django.contrib.sessions',
    'django.contrib.sites',
    'django.contrib.admin',
    'greenmachine.base',
    'greenmachine.module.document',
    'greenmachine.module.registration',
    'django.contrib.markup', 
)

Use filter in template

In template, add "{% load markup %}" in the beginning. Use appropriate filter. ... {{ myText|textile }}
... {{ myText|restructuredtext}}
... {{ myText|markdown}}
My document template looks like this:

{% extends "index.html" %}
{% load markup %}
{% block content %}
	Title: {{object.title}}
	Description:
  {{object.description|restructuredtext}}
{% endblock %}

Input text

Benefits of Django
========================

* runs on python
* fast development
* fast execution
* free and open-source
* lots of commercial success

Django requirement
========================
* mod_python or fcgi capable web server
* python 2.3 or above
* optional libraries: PIL, docutils, MySQLdb

Result