Using Djocker

Djocker is a barebones app that can help with quickly setting up a dockerized Django application, with Nginx as a reverse proxy and PostgreSQL as the database. This guide will help you get started with it.

Ensure you have docker-machine and docker-compose installed.

Create your app’s repo, cd into it and checkout a working branch

foo@bar:~$ mkdir my_django_app && cd my_django_app
foo@bar:~$ git init
foo@bar:~$ git checkout -b develop

Add the Djocker repo as a fork

foo@bar:~$ git remote add fork https://github.com/jimmykamau/djocker.git

Pull Djocker

foo@bar:~$ git pull fork master

Change the name of the Django app’s directory in the web folder from djocker to the name of your app

foo@bar:~$ cd web
foo@bar:~$ mv djocker ./django_api

Update the following files:

# docker-compose.yml

command: gunicorn django_api.wsgi:application -w 2 -b :8000

# web/django_api/settings/base.py

ROOT_URLCONF = 'django_api.urls'
WSGI_APPLICATION = 'django_api.wsgi.application'

# web/django_api/settings/__init__.py

if current_environment == "PRODUCTION":
    from django_api.settings.production import *
elif current_environment == "DEVELOPMENT":
    from django_api.settings.development import *

# web/django_api/settings/development.py

from django_api.settings.base import *

# web/django_api/wsgi.py

os.environ.setdefault('DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE', 'django_api.settings')

# web/manage.py

os.environ.setdefault('DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE', 'django_api.settings')

cd into the app’s root directory

foo@bar:~$ cd ../

Create an .env file with the following variables:

ENVIRONMENT_SETTINGS=DEVELOPMENT
SECRET_KEY=my_super_secret_key
DATABASE_URL=postgres://postgres:@db:5432/django_api

Build the images

foo@bar:~$ docker-compose build

Start the db service

foo@bar:~$ docker-compose up -d db

Grab a psql shell from the db service

foo@bar:~$ docker-compose exec db psql -U postgres -h db -p 5432
psql (11.1 (Debian 11.1-1.pgdg90+1))
Type "help" for help.

postgres=#

Create a database with the name you specified in the .env file, then exit the shell

postgres=# CREATE DATABASE django_api;
CREATE DATABASE
postgres=# \q

Start the remaining services

foo@bar:~$ docker-compose up -d

Ensure the services have been started successfully

foo@bar:~$ docker-compose ps
         Name                       Command               State                    Ports
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
my_django_app_db_1      docker-entrypoint.sh postgres    Up      0.0.0.0:5432->5432/tcp
my_django_app_nginx_1   nginx -g daemon off;             Up      0.0.0.0:443->443/tcp, 0.0.0.0:80->80/tcp
my_django_app_web_1     gunicorn django_api.wsgi:a ...   Up      8000/tcp

Visit this url and you should be welcomed with the default Django page.