path: root/docs/tutorials/wiki2/basiclayout.rst

============
Basic Layout
============

The starter files generated by the ``alchemy`` scaffold are very basic, but
they provide a good orientation for the high-level patterns common to most
:term:`URL dispatch`-based :app:`Pyramid` projects.


Application configuration with ``__init__.py``
----------------------------------------------

A directory on disk can be turned into a Python :term:`package` by containing
an ``__init__.py`` file.  Even if empty, this marks a directory as a Python
package.  We use ``__init__.py`` both as a marker, indicating the directory in
which it's contained is a package, and to contain application configuration
code.

Open ``tutorial/__init__.py``.  It should already contain the
following:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :linenos:
  :language: py

Let's go over this piece-by-piece.  First, we need some imports to support
later code:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :end-before: main
  :linenos:
  :lineno-match:
  :language: py

``__init__.py`` defines a function named ``main``.  Here is the entirety of
the ``main`` function we've defined in our ``__init__.py``:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :pyobject: main
  :linenos:
  :lineno-match:
  :language: py

When you invoke the ``pserve development.ini`` command, the ``main`` function
above is executed.  It accepts some settings and returns a :term:`WSGI`
application.  (See :ref:`startup_chapter` for more about ``pserve``.)

Next in ``main``, construct a :term:`Configurator` object:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :lines: 7
  :lineno-match:
  :language: py

``settings`` is passed to the Configurator as a keyword argument with the
dictionary values passed as the ``**settings`` argument.  This will be a
dictionary of settings parsed from the ``.ini`` file, which contains
deployment-related values such as ``pyramid.reload_templates``,
``sqlalchemy.url``, and so on.

Next include :term:`Jinja2` templating bindings so that we can use renderers
with the ``.jinja2`` extension within our project.

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :lines: 8
  :lineno-match:
  :language: py

Next include the the package ``models`` using a dotted Python path. The
exact setup of the models will be covered later.

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :lines: 9
  :lineno-match:
  :language: py

``main`` now calls :meth:`pyramid.config.Configurator.add_static_view` with
two arguments: ``static`` (the name), and ``static`` (the path):

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :lines: 10
  :lineno-match:
  :language: py

This registers a static resource view which will match any URL that starts
with the prefix ``/static`` (by virtue of the first argument to
``add_static_view``).  This will serve up static resources for us from within
the ``static`` directory of our ``tutorial`` package, in this case, via
``http://localhost:6543/static/`` and below (by virtue of the second argument
to ``add_static_view``).  With this declaration, we're saying that any URL that
starts with ``/static`` should go to the static view; any remainder of its
path (e.g. the ``/foo`` in ``/static/foo``) will be used to compose a path to
a static file resource, such as a CSS file.

Using the configurator ``main`` also registers a :term:`route configuration`
via the :meth:`pyramid.config.Configurator.add_route` method that will be
used when the URL is ``/``:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :lines: 11
  :lineno-match:
  :language: py

Since this route has a ``pattern`` equaling ``/``, it is the route that will
be matched when the URL ``/`` is visited, e.g., ``http://localhost:6543/``.

``main`` next calls the ``scan`` method of the configurator
(:meth:`pyramid.config.Configurator.scan`), which will recursively scan our
``tutorial`` package, looking for ``@view_config`` (and
other special) decorators.  When it finds a ``@view_config`` decorator, a
view configuration will be registered, which will allow one of our
application URLs to be mapped to some code.

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :lines: 12
  :lineno-match:
  :language: py

Finally ``main`` is finished configuring things, so it uses the
:meth:`pyramid.config.Configurator.make_wsgi_app` method to return a
:term:`WSGI` application:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/__init__.py
  :lines: 13
  :lineno-start: 13
  :language: py


View declarations via the ``views`` package
-------------------------------------------

The main function of a web framework is mapping each URL pattern to code (a
:term:`view callable`) that is executed when the requested URL matches the
corresponding :term:`route`. Our application uses the
:meth:`pyramid.view.view_config` decorator to perform this mapping.

Open ``tutorial/views/default.py`` in the ``views`` package.  It
should already contain the following:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/views/default.py
  :linenos:
  :language: py

The important part here is that the ``@view_config`` decorator associates the
function it decorates (``my_view``) with a :term:`view configuration`, 
consisting of:

   * a ``route_name`` (``home``)
   * a ``renderer``, which is a template from the ``templates`` subdirectory of
     the package.

When the pattern associated with the ``home`` view is matched during a request,
``my_view()`` will be executed.  ``my_view()`` returns a dictionary; the
renderer will use the ``templates/mytemplate.jinja2`` template to create a
response based on the values in the dictionary.

Note that ``my_view()`` accepts a single argument named ``request``.  This is
the standard call signature for a Pyramid :term:`view callable`.

Remember in our ``__init__.py`` when we executed the
:meth:`pyramid.config.Configurator.scan` method ``config.scan()``?  The
purpose of calling the scan method was to find and process this
``@view_config`` decorator in order to create a view configuration within our
application.  Without being processed by ``scan``, the decorator effectively
does nothing.  ``@view_config`` is inert without being detected via a
:term:`scan`.

The sample ``my_view()`` created by the scaffold uses a ``try:`` and
``except:`` clause to detect if there is a problem accessing the project
database and provide an alternate error response.  That response will include
the text shown at the end of the file, which will be displayed in the browser
to inform the user about possible actions to take to solve the problem.


Content models with the ``models`` package
------------------------------------------

In a SQLAlchemy-based application, a *model* object is an object composed by
querying the SQL database. The ``models`` package is where the ``alchemy``
scaffold put the classes that implement our models.

First, open ``tutorial/models/meta.py``, which should already contain
the following:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/models/meta.py
  :linenos:
  :language: py

``meta.py`` contains imports and support code for defining the models. We
create a dictionary ``NAMING_CONVENTION`` as well for consistent naming of
support objects like indices and constraints.

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/models/meta.py
  :end-before: metadata
  :linenos:
  :language: py

Next we create a ``metadata`` object from the class
:class:`sqlalchemy.schema.MetaData`, using ``NAMING_CONVENTION`` as the value
for the ``naming_convention`` argument.

A ``MetaData`` object represents the table and other schema definitions for
a single database. We also need to create a declarative ``Base`` object to use
as a base class for our models. Our models will inherit from this ``Base``
which will attach the tables to the ``metadata`` we created and define our
application's database schema.

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/models/meta.py
  :lines: 15-16
  :lineno-match:
  :linenos:
  :language: py

We've defined the ``models`` as a packge to make it straightforward to
define models separately in different modules. To give a simple example of a
model class, we define one named ``MyModel`` in a ``mymodel.py``:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/models/mymodel.py
  :pyobject: MyModel
  :linenos:
  :language: py

Our example model does not require an ``__init__`` method because SQLAlchemy
supplies for us a default constructor if one is not already present, which
accepts keyword arguments of the same name as that of the mapped attributes.

.. note:: Example usage of MyModel:

   .. code-block:: python

       johnny = MyModel(name="John Doe", value=10)

The ``MyModel`` class has a ``__tablename__`` attribute.  This informs
SQLAlchemy which table to use to store the data representing instances of this
class.

Finally, open ``tutorial/models/__init__.py``, which should already
contain the following:

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/models/__init__.py
  :linenos:
  :language: py

Our ``models/__init__.py`` module defines the primary API we will use for
configuring the database connections within our application and it contains
several functions we will cover below.

As we mentioned above, the purpose of the ``models.meta.metadata`` object is
to describe the schema of the database and this is done by defining models
that inherit from the ``Base`` attached to that ``metadata`` object. In
Python, code is only executed if it is imported and so to attach the
``models`` table, defined in ``mymodel.py`` to the ``metadata`` we must
import it. If we skip this step then later when we run
:meth:`sqlalchemy.schema.MetaData.create_all` the table will not be created
because the ``metadata`` does not know about it!

Another important reason to import all of the models is that when
defining relationships between models they must all exist in order for
SQLAlchemy to find and build those internal mappings. This is why after
importing all the models we explicitly execute the function
:func:`sqlalchemy.orm.configure_mappers`, once we are sure all the models have
been defined and before we start creating connections.

Next we define several functions for connecting to our database. The first
and lowest level is the ``get_engine`` function which creates an
:term:`SQLAlchemy` database engine using :func:`sqlalchemy.engine_from_config`
from the ``sqlalchemy.``-prefixed settings in the ``development.ini``
file's ``[app:main]`` section, which is a URI (something like ``sqlite://``).

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/models/__init__.py
  :pyobject: get_engine
  :lineno-match:
  :linenos:
  :language: py

The function ``get_session_factory`` accepts an :term:`SQLAlchemy` database
engine, and creates a ``session_factory`` from the :term:`SQLAlchemy`
class :class:`sqlalchemy.orm.session.sessionmaker`, which is then used for
creating sessions bound to the database engine.

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/models/__init__.py
  :pyobject: get_session_factory
  :lineno-match:
  :linenos:
  :language: py

The function ``get_tm_session`` registers a database session with a transaction
manager, and returns a ``dbsession`` object. With the transaction manager, our
application will automatically issue a transaction commit after every request
unless an exception is raised, in which case the transaction will be aborted.

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/models/__init__.py
  :pyobject: get_tm_session
  :lineno-match:
  :linenos:
  :language: py

Finally, we define an ``includeme`` function, which is a hook for use with
:meth:`pyramid.config.Configurator.include` to activate code in a Pyramid
application addon. It is the code that is executed above when we ran
``config.include('.models')`` in our application's ``main`` function. This
function will take the settings from the application, create an engine
and define a ``request.dbsession`` property which we can use to do work
on behalf of an incoming request to our application.

.. literalinclude:: src/basiclayout/tutorial/models/__init__.py
  :pyobject: includeme
  :lineno-match:
  :linenos:
  :language: py

That's about all there is to it regarding models, views, and initialization
code in our stock application.

The ``Index`` import and the ``Index`` object creation in ``mymodel.py`` is
not required for this tutorial, and will be removed in the next step.