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I have a script that imports a models.py from an app, but it will not import! I don't believe I am supposed to manually create an "export DJANGO..." environment variable...I'm doing something else wrong.

 Traceback (most recent call last):
      File "parse.py", line 8, in ?
        from butterfly.flower.models import Channel, Item
      File "/home/user/shri/butterfly/flower/models.py", line 1, in ?
        from django.db import models
      File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/db/__init__.py", line 10, in ?
        if not settings.DATABASE_ENGINE:
      File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/utils/functional.py", line 269, in __getattr__
        self._setup()
      File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/django/conf/__init__.py", line 38, in _setup
        raise ImportError("Settings cannot be imported, because environment variable %s is undefined." % ENVIRONMENT_VARIABLE)
    ImportError: Settings cannot be imported, because environment variable DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE is undefined.
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6 Answers 6

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38

You need to properly import your settings file. If you don't import the django environment variables first, your import will fail as you've noticed. You need to code something like:

import os

# Set the DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE environment variable.
os.environ['DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE'] = "myproject.settings"

#do your stuff
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1
  • It should also be noted that this command must go before you do any other imports from your project.
    – Dennis Golomazov
    Commented Jul 1, 2014 at 14:33
17

I don't believe I am supposed to manually create an "export DJANGO..." environment variable...

Manually or otherwise, you are supposed to ensure that variable is in the environment before you import a Django models file -- not sure what the causes are for your disbelief, but, whatever they may be, that disbelief is ill-founded.

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3
  • Thanks. So, is it reasonable to say that after setting up a Django project, it is REQUIRED to set 2 environment variables? -DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE -PYTHONPATH ..append the project path.?
    – TIMEX
    Commented Oct 29, 2009 at 3:28
  • 1
    @hasen, guess I have pretty high expectations from anybody named "alex";-).
    – Alex Martelli
    Commented Oct 29, 2009 at 4:14
  • @alex, the alternative is to make sure that you've "cut the dependencies" by shoving into sys.modules a fake version of some of the modules django's trying to import -- e.g., if you set sys.modules['django.db'] to your own fake object that perfectly and entirely mimics what your models.py expects (and possibly other fakes along the way), it might be feasible to avoid environment settings. But, it would certainly be a "tour de force"!
    – Alex Martelli
    Commented Oct 29, 2009 at 4:17
14

from command line ran "python manage.py shell" should include the right settings for you and give you the python prompt.

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7

One alternative to messing about with the environment is to just write your script as a Django custom management command, which takes care of setting up the environment for you (along with other things like option parsing, etc).

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0

I had this similar error, and I realized that I forgot to create the file "init.py" in to the app folder:

myapp:
    manage.py
    myapp:
        __init__.py
        settings.py
        ....
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0

From command line, please execute this command. This may help you:

export DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE=projectname.settings
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