Django. South. Heroku. KeyError: 'default'

database, django, django-south, heroku

Solution

When you comment out `South` in your `INSTALLED_APPS`, does it let you run `python manage.py syncdb` locally?

I think the problem is that you're overwriting your `default` database with your `dj_database_url` lines in your `settings.py`. When you're on Heroku, there's an environment variable named `DATABASE_URL`, which is what `dj_database_url` uses to config your database. However, if you don't have a similar environment variable locally, you won't be configuring your database correctly. The reason South is throwing an error is because it tries to connect to your database upon initialization (note how the error comes from South's `__init__`). If you tried to actually use your database locally after commenting out South, I'm guessing you'd get an error.

There are two ways to fix this. The first, and easiest, is to make a `DATABASE_URL` variable on your local machine. Given the settings you listed above, set your `DATABASE_URL` to `'postgres://alejandro:zzzzz@localhost/dbolib'`. The second, and more difficult, is to add something in your settings to essentially check if you're on Heroku and, if not, skip over the `dj_database_url` configuration. Basically, nest your `dj_database_url` lines in your settings inside an `if` statement that would return `True` if on Heroku and `False` if not.

EDIT:

It gets a little messy, but if you want to keep it all in one file, you could do something like the following:

First, try to set your default database using `dj_database_url`. This means moving the following code ABOVE the `DATABASES` setting in your settings:

import dj_database_url
DATABASES = {}
DATABASES['default'] = dj_database_url.config()

This code sets your default database equal to the result from dj_database_url. However, there may not be a result. You'll want to test for this (which would indicate local development) and set a database accordingly. So, AFTER THE PREVIOUS CODE, add the following code:

if len(DATABASES['default']) == 0:
    DATABASES = {
        'default': {
            'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.postgresql_psycopg2',
            'NAME': 'dbolib',
            'USER': 'alejandro',
            'PASSWORD': 'zzzzz'
    }
}

This checks to see if you have anything in your DATABASES['default'] and, if not, sets your default database using your local settings.

This is a little messy, but it'll work. The better option may be to use different settings files, which adds another layer of complexity. Truly, the best option is to set your `DATABASE_URL` environment variable on all of your machines so that `dj_database_url` works as it should.

Problem

Original source