I am attempting to serve a django app with a vue frontend and need some help configuring the static files.
How do I get Django to recognize this built path as an attempt to reach a static file, or alternatively, how do I modify the post-build injection path on the Vue side to match the current Django static-file settings?
Django serves the built index.html from vue, however it can not find the static files (scripts/css) that are autoinjected from the build process due to the path being "absolute". I have modified the vue.config.js to not autoinject the scripts (since they will need {% static %} during the build, and the template index.html to add them in appropriately.
My directory structure is as follows:
- Root
- app
- migrations
- templates
- app (outputDir)
- index.html (Built from vue)
- base.html
- templateFolder1
- templateFolder2
- various .py files
- assets (assetsDir)
- css
- static files
- js
- static files
- frontend
- public
- index.html (Template for build for vue)
- src
- assets
- components
- App.vue
- main.js
The build is run from the frontend directory, with --no-clean to not delete my django templates folder on build.
Here is my workaround for adding {% static %} tags to the built index.html. I realize I am breaking the convention vue has that assetsDir is a subdirectory of outputDir, and I am not opposed to adding another staticfile dir to the settings.py to match the convention (although my issue is still the same).
publicPath: isProd ? '/app/' : '/',
outputDir: __dirname + '/../app/templates/app',
assetsDir: "../../../assets",
indexPath: './index.html',
configureWebpack: {
...
plugins: [
new HtmlWebpackPlugin({
template: __dirname + '/public/index.html',
favicon: __dirname + '/../assets/img/favicon/favicon.ico',
inject: false,
minify: false
})
],
},
{% load static %}
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge">
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0">
<title>MAPP Remote</title>
<link rel="shortcut icon" href="{% static '<%= htmlWebpackPlugin.files.favicon %>' %}">
<% for (key in htmlWebpackPlugin.files.css) { %> <link rel="stylesheet" href="{% static '<%= htmlWebpackPlugin.files.css[key] %>' %}"> <% } %>
</head>
<body>
...
<div id="app"></div>
<!-- built files will be auto injected -->
<% for (key in htmlWebpackPlugin.files.js) { %> <script type="text/javascript" src="{% static '<%= htmlWebpackPlugin.files.js[key] %>' %}"></script> <% } %>
</body>
</html>
The built index.html:
{% load static %}
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge">
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0">
<title>MAPP Remote</title>
<link rel="shortcut icon" href="{% static '/app/favicon.ico' %}">
<link rel="stylesheet" href="{% static '/app/../../../assets/css/chunk-vendors.0ba3e87d.css' %}"> <link rel="stylesheet" href="{% static '/app/../../../assets/css/app.fb012fc8.css' %}">
</head>
<body>
...
<div id="app"></div>
<!-- built files will be auto injected -->
<script type="text/javascript" src="{% static '/app/../../../assets/js/chunk-vendors.6a3b11f1.js' %}"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="{% static '/app/../../../assets/js/app.45295baa.js' %}"></script>
</body>
</html>
My django settings.py configuration for static files:
...
BASE_DIR = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)))
STATIC_URL = "/static/"
STATICFILES_DIRS = [os.path.join(BASE_DIR, "assets")]
STATIC_ROOT = os.path.join(BASE_DIR, "staticfiles")
STATICFILES_STORAGE = "whitenoise.storage.CompressedManifestStaticFilesStorage"
...
The way my static file finders are configured via Django requires modification to the built script/css paths inside of app/templates/app/index.html.
In stead of <script src="{% static '/app/../../../assets/js/chunk-vendors.6a3b11f1.js' %}">
The path currently needs to be <script src="{% static 'js/chunk-vendors.6a3b11f1.js' %}">
Changing the assetsDir path in vue.config.js to match the Vue convention of having assets be a subdirectory of outputDir results in a similar issue in which the path is 'app/assets/js/...' rather than 'js/...'
I decided to adjust the path that is loaded into the template during the Vue build by modifying public/index.html file as well as the vue.config.js options. I declared a const asset_dir = '/asset/dir in vue.config.js and then added this as an extra option to the HtmlWebpackPlugin to pull it into the template. Lastly, I substring the path for the static files by the length of the unnecessary portion of the path.
const asset_dir = "../../../assets"
module.exports = {
publicPath: isProd ? '/app/' : '/',
outputDir: __dirname + '/../app/templates/app',
assetsDir: asset_dir,
indexPath: './index.html',
configureWebpack: {
...
plugins: [
new HtmlWebpackPlugin({
template: __dirname + '/public/index.html',
inject: false,
minify: false,
assetsDir: asset_dir
})
],
}
}
{% load static %}
<% if (htmlWebpackPlugin.options['assetsDir'] !== undefined) { %> <% var assetDirLength = htmlWebpackPlugin.options['assetsDir'].length + htmlWebpackPlugin.files.publicPath.length + "/".length%> <% } %>
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge">
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width,initial-scale=1.0">
<title>MAPP Remote</title>
<link rel="shortcut icon" href="{% static 'img/favicon/favicon.ico' %}">
<% for (key in htmlWebpackPlugin.files.css) { %> <link rel="stylesheet" href="{% static '<%= htmlWebpackPlugin.files.css[key].substr(assetDirLength) %>' %}"> <% } %>
</head>
<body>
<div id="app"></div>
<!-- built files will be auto injected -->
<!-- Pulled from htmlWebpackPlugin Docs -->
<!-- https://github.com/jaketrent/html-webpack-template/blob/86f285d5c790a6c15263f5cc50fd666d51f974fd/index.html -->
<% for (var chunk in htmlWebpackPlugin.files.chunks) { %>
<script src="{% static '<%= htmlWebpackPlugin.files.chunks[chunk].entry.substr(assetDirLength) %>' %}"></script>
<% } %>
</body>
</html>