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Python Django Basics What a View! First URL

Posted by Andrea Wiley
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Andrea Wiley
Python Development Techdegree Graduate 10,888 Points

is this challenge broken? https://teamtreehouse.com/library/django-basics/what-a-view/first-url

So I was just trying to wrap up some of the quizzes I skipped over. Either I'm totally not tracking today, or this challenge is broken?

newspaper/urls.py 
from django.conf.urls import url
from . import views

urlpatterns = [
    path('', index)
]

1 Answer

rydavim
rydavim
18,814 Points
rydavim
rydavim
18,814 Points

I haven't been through any Django stuff, and I kind of suck at regex. So unfortunately I won't be able to go into too much detail about why this is true, or any more advanced expressions, but...

My understanding is that path('', index) isn't strictly defining an empty string. I think you need r'^$' to ensure you're matching an entirely empty string. When Django encounters an empty string, I believe it will go to the index page.

Trying that along with making sure to reference views.index fixed it for me. Sorry I can't more clearly explain why this works, but maybe it will trigger your memory. 😅

url(r'^$', views.index)
Andrea Wiley
.a{fill-rule:evenodd;}techdegree seal-36
Andrea Wiley
Python Development Techdegree Graduate 10,888 Points

smacks forehead

That would make sense. I've been using almost exclusively on 3.0 and up.... no regex in the URLs needed if you have an empty path there!

rydavim
rydavim
18,814 Points
rydavim
rydavim
18,814 Points

I can definitely understand that. Trying to remember how to write normal JavaScript when I've used jQuery simple syntax for so long is tough - I forget all the extra stuff you need to explicitly write.