Python Django Course

Lesson 1 • Version Control with Git

Introduces Git workflows essential for tracking Django project changes. Connects to professional collaboration practices used throughout the course.

Lesson 2 • Setting Up a Python Environment

Guides creation of isolated virtual environments and dependency management with pip. Ensures a reproducible workspace before any Django code is written.

Lesson 3 • HTTP and the Request-Response Cycle

Explains how browsers and servers communicate via HTTP methods, headers, and status codes. Provides the mental model underlying Django's view layer.

Lesson 1 • Django Apps and the MTV Pattern

Explains the Model-Template-View architecture and how apps modularise functionality. Clarifies how Django differs from classic MVC frameworks.

Lesson 2 • Settings and Configuration Management

Covers the settings module, environment-specific configs, and secret key handling. Prepares students for secure, multi-environment deployments later.

Lesson 3 • URL Routing and URLconf

Teaches path(), include(), and named URL patterns for routing requests to views. Connects directly to the view layer introduced in the next chapter.

Lesson 1 • Migrations and Schema Management

Explains makemigrations, migrate, and how Django tracks schema changes over time. Ensures students can evolve databases safely in team environments.

Lesson 2 • Defining Models and Fields

Introduces model classes, field types, and Meta options for table configuration. Forms the data layer that views and templates depend on.

Lesson 3 • Model Managers and Custom QuerySets

Shows how to encapsulate reusable query logic in custom managers and QuerySet methods. Promotes clean, DRY data-access patterns across the application.

Lesson 4 • ORM Queries and QuerySets

Covers CRUD operations, filtering, ordering, and QuerySet chaining. Builds the data-retrieval skills used in every view written later.

Lesson 1 • Static Files and Media Handling

Explains serving CSS, JavaScript, and user-uploaded files during development. Prepares students for production static file strategies covered later.

Lesson 2 • Django Template Language

Covers template syntax, filters, tags, and template inheritance for DRY layouts. Enables dynamic HTML generation from view context data.

Lesson 3 • Function-Based Views

Teaches writing views as Python functions that accept requests and return responses. Provides the simplest entry point to Django's view layer.

Lesson 1 • Form Validation and Error Display

Covers built-in validators, custom validators, and rendering error messages in templates. Ensures robust input sanitisation before data reaches the database.

Lesson 2 • ModelForms and Form Saving

Generates forms directly from model definitions to reduce duplication. Covers save(), commit=False, and handling related objects.

Lesson 3 • Django Form Classes

Builds forms from Form subclasses with typed fields and widget customisation. Establishes the foundation for all user-input processing in the course.

Lesson 1 • Django Security Best Practices

Addresses CSRF protection, XSS prevention, SQL injection defence, and clickjacking headers. Applies Django's built-in security middleware correctly.

Lesson 2 • Permissions and Groups

Teaches object-level and model-level permissions, groups, and the @permission_required decorator. Enables fine-grained access control across views.

Lesson 3 • Registration and Password Management

Builds user registration flows and integrates Django's password reset views. Covers email-based token workflows for credential recovery.

Lesson 1 • DRF Installation and Core Concepts

Installs DRF, registers it, and explains the serializer-view-router pipeline. Establishes the API architecture pattern used throughout this chapter.

Lesson 2 • Filtering, Pagination, and Throttling

Adds query-parameter filtering, cursor and page-number pagination, and rate limiting to APIs. Produces production-ready endpoints that handle large datasets.

Lesson 3 • API Authentication and Permissions

Implements token authentication, session auth, and DRF permission classes for API security. Builds on the auth concepts from the previous chapter.

Lesson 4 • Serializers and Data Validation

Covers Serializer and ModelSerializer for converting querysets to JSON and validating input. Mirrors the role Django forms play in the HTML layer.

Lesson 1 • Testing Django Applications

Uses Django's TestCase, Client, and APIClient to test models, views, and endpoints. Establishes quality assurance practices before any code ships.

Lesson 2 • Serving Static Files and Media in Production

Runs collectstatic, configures a web server to serve assets, and integrates cloud object storage. Completes the static and media pipeline started in Chapter 4.

Lesson 3 • Continuous Integration and Code Quality

Configures CI pipelines to run tests, linting, and coverage checks automatically. Enforces code quality standards across team contributions.

Lesson 4 • Deploying with Docker and a Cloud Platform

Containerises the Django app with Docker, writes a Compose file, and deploys to a cloud platform. Produces a repeatable, portable deployment pipeline.