Upload an image from Django shell
django, file, python, shell
Solution
I'd been bit by this before, so I feel you -- but as per my comment: replace the `'r'` with `'rb'` in the File() call, and it should work fine.
I should also add, for those who come upon this answer later, that this is an issue specific to Python3. Take a look at the SO link in Steve's comment for a fuller explanation of the difference in `File()` between p2 and p3.
Problem
I need to import a bunch of images into a Django app. I am testing in the shell but cannot get past this error when attempting to save the image: ``` File "/lib/python3.3/codecs.py", line 301, in decode (result, consumed) = self._buffer_decode(data, self.errors, final) UnicodeDecodeError: 'utf-8' codec can't decode byte 0xff in position 0: invalid start byte ``` The model: ``` import uuid from django.db import models from taggit.managers import TaggableManager import os def generate_filename(instance, filename): f, ext = os.path.splitext(filename) name = uuid.uuid4().hex return 'images/%s%s' % (name, ext) class StudyImage(models.Model): pic = models.ImageField(upload_to=generate_filename) upload_date = models.DateTimeField(auto_now_add=True) tags = TaggableManager() ``` The steps to get to the error: Open a django shell. ``` import uuid import os from app import models p = File(open('/home/image001.png', 'r')) a = models.StudyImage(pic=p) a.pic.save('test.jpg',p) ``` Which gives the error above. I cannot figure out why an image is giving a unicodecodeerror... I got this far referring to "Upload" a file from django shell More details: Django 1.7, Python 3.3 Full traceback: ``` Traceback (most recent call last):<br> File "<input>", line 1, in <module><br> File "/home/s/Pycharm/flf/venv/lib/python3.3/site- packages/django/db/models/fields/files.py", line 89, in save self.name = self.storage.save(name, content) File "/home/s/Pycharm/flf/venv/lib/python3.3/site- packages/django/core/files/storage.py", line 51, in save name = self._save(name, content) File "/home/s/Pycharm/flf/venv/lib/python3.3/site- packages/django/core/files/storage.py", line 224, in _save for chunk in content.chunks(): File "/home/s/Pycharm/flf/venv/lib/python3.3/site-packages/django/core/files/base.py", line 77, in chunks data = self.read(chunk_size) File "/home/s/Pycharm/flf/venv/lib/python3.3/codecs.py", line 301, in decode (result, consumed) = self._buffer_decode(data, self.errors, final) UnicodeDecodeError: 'utf-8' codec can't decode byte 0x89 in position 0: invalid start byte ```