Empty Request.FILES with Django Upload forms

Question

Trying to use a very simple form to upload a file into a new class instance. I am expecting to have both files in request.FILES but it's empty. I am on the bundled dev server.

been stuck here and went through all related questions ...

wayfinder_map.media_file = request.FILES['media_file']

generates

MultiValueDictKeyError: "Key 'media_file' not found in MultiValueDict: {}>"

model

class WayfinderMap(models.Model):
    """ Way-finding Map Config"""


    media_file = models.FileField(upload_to="maps", null=True, blank=True) 
    wall_file = models.FileField(upload_to="maps_data", null=True, blank=True) 

view

@login_required
def create_map(request, form_class=WayfinderMapForm, template_name="wayfinder/map/create.html"):
wayfinder_map_form = form_class(request.user, request.POST or None, request.FILES)

    if wayfinder_map_form.is_valid():
        wayfinder_map = wayfinder_map_form.save(commit=False)
        wayfinder_map.media_file = request.FILES['media_file']
        wayfinder_map.data_file = request.FILES['data_file']
        wayfinder_map.creator = request.user
        wayfinder_map.save()
    return HttpResponseRedirect(wayfinder_map.get_absolute_url())

return render_to_response(template_name, {
    "wayfinder_map_form": wayfinder_map_form,
}, context_instance=RequestContext(request))

template

<form enctype="multipart/form-data" class="uniForm" id="wayfinder_map_form" method="POST" action="">
        <fieldset class="inlineLabels">
            {{ wayfinder_map_form|as_uni_form }}
            <div class="form_block">
                <input type="hidden" name="action" value="create" />
                <input type="submit" value="{% trans 'create' %}"/>
            </div>
        </fieldset>
    </form>

Answer 1

I think your troubles may lie in assigning data to a form without first verifying the the request is POST

@login_required
def create_map(request, form_class=WayfinderMapForm, template_name="wayfinder/map create.html"):
  if request.method=='POST':
    wayfinder_map_form = form_class(request.user, data=request.POST, files=request.FILES)

    if wayfinder_map_form.is_valid():
      #save your data
      return HttpResponseRedirect(wayfinder_map.get_absolute_url())

  else:
    wayfinder_map_form=form_class(request.user)

 return render_to_response(template_name, {"wayfinder_map_form": wayfinder_map_form,}, context_instance=RequestContext(request))

Answer 2

It seems as request.FILES is not necessary in this case (good thing cause it's empty ...)

I modified this line

wayfinder_map.media_file = request.FILES['media_file']

for

wayfinder_map.media_file = wayfinder_map_form.cleaned_data['media_file']

and it works. Not sure what the right way to do thing though... –