Could not import Django settings into Google App Engine

Question

Hello all you Google App Engine experts,

I have used Django a little before but am new to Google App Engine and am trying to use it's development web server with Django for the first time.

I don't know if this is relevent but I previously had Django 1.1 and Python 2.6 on my Windows XP and even though I have uninstalled Python 2.6 there is still a folder and entries in the registry.

I have followed the instructions from Google but when I browse to the GAE developemnt web server it cannot find my settings (details below).

Any hints gratefully received.

Regards

Geoff

C:\Documents and Settings\GeoffK\My Documents\ing\ingsite>echo %PATH% 
C:\WINDOWS\system32;C:\WINDOWS;C:\WINDOWS\System32\Wbem;C:\WINDOWS 
\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0;;C:\Python25;C:\Python25\Lib\site- 
packages\django\bin;C:\Documents and Settings\GeoffK\My Documents\ing 
\ingsite;C:\Program Files\Google\google_appengine\ 
C:\Documents and Settings\GeoffK\My Documents\ing\ingsite>echo 
%PYTHONPATH% 
C:\Documents and Settings\GeoffK\My Documents\ing\ingsite 
C:\Documents and Settings\GeoffK\My Documents\ing\ingsite>C:\Documents 
and Settings\GeoffK\My Documents\ing\ingsite>dev_appserver.py -- 
debug_imports ingiliz\ 
INFO     2009-08-04 07:29:45,328 appengine_rpc.py:157] Server: 
appengine.google. 
com 
INFO     2009-08-04 07:29:45,358 appcfg.py:322] Checking for updates 
to the SDK. 
INFO     2009-08-04 07:29:45,578 appcfg.py:336] The SDK is up to date. 
WARNING  2009-08-04 07:29:45,578 datastore_file_stub.py:404] Could not 
read data 
store data from c:\docume~1\geoffk\locals~1\temp 
\dev_appserver.datastore 
WARNING  2009-08-04 07:29:45,578 datastore_file_stub.py:404] Could not 
read data 
store data from c:\docume~1\geoffk\locals~1\temp 
\dev_appserver.datastore.history 
WARNING  2009-08-04 07:29:45,608 dev_appserver.py:3296] Could not 
initialize ima 
ges API; you are likely missing the Python "PIL" module. ImportError: 
No module 
named _imaging 
INFO     2009-08-04 07:29:45,625 dev_appserver_main.py:465] Running 
application 
ingiliz on port 8080: http://localhost:8080

..... Now attempting to browse if need more detail here I can post .....

    if not settings.DATABASE_ENGINE: 
  File "C:\Python25\lib\site-packages\django\conf\__init__.py", line 
28, in __ge 
tattr__ 
    self._import_settings() 
  File "C:\Python25\lib\site-packages\django\conf\__init__.py", line 
59, in _imp 
ort_settings 
    self._target = Settings(settings_module) 
  File "C:\Python25\lib\site-packages\django\conf\__init__.py", line 
94, in __in 
it__ 
    raise ImportError, "Could not import settings '%s' (Is it on 
sys.path? Does 
it have syntax errors?): %s" % (self.SETTINGS_MODULE, e) 
ImportError: Could not import settings 'settings' (Is it on sys.path? 
Does it ha 
ve syntax errors?): No module named settings 
INFO     2009-08-04 07:31:02,187 dev_appserver.py:2982] "GET / HTTP/ 
1.1" 500 -

Answer 1

I had a similar problem and I put an empty settings.py file in my root directory and it worked.

Good Luck

Answer 2

for local testing add these at the start of your main.py

import os, sys
os.environ["DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE"] = "appid.settings"
sys.path.append("/app/folder")

Answer 3

How are you developing the application using Django and google application engine?

If you are using Django, settings.py should already be there.

Tyr App engine patch

it provides a good starting point to develop the applications using Google app and Django.