Django DateField default options

Question

I have a model which has a date time field:

date = models.DateField(_("Date"), default=datetime.now())

When I check the app in the built in django admin, the DateField also has the time appended to it, so that if you try to save it it returns an error. How do I make the default just the date? (datetime.today() isn't working either)

Answer 1

You mistake is using the datetime module instead of the date module. You meant to do this:

from datetime import date
date = models.DateField(_("Date"), default=date.today)

But the proper way to handle this is to use the auto_now_add parameter:

date = models.DateField(_("Date"), auto_now_add=True)

Answer 2

This is why you should always import the base datetime module: import datetime, rather than the datetime class within that module: from datetime import datetime.

The other mistake you have made is to actually call the function in the default, with the (). This means that all models will get the date at the time the class is first defined - so if your server stays up for days or weeks without restarting Apache, all elements will get same the initial date.

So the field should be:

date = models.DateField(_("Date"), default=datetime.date.today)