How to pass a variable to urls.py

Question

I have a database 'artist' with one table : 'name', 'style'. Users can add any names for an artist.

I would like to pass an argument to url in my template, like this :

<a href="{% url 'webgui.views.music' artist.name %}" style="margin-bottom: 3px" type="button"

But is it possible to set dynamically the URL with the argument 'artist.name' (in urls.py) ?

My urls.py actually :

url(r'^music/(\d+)/$', 'webgui.views.music'),

Maybe I need to change '\d+' by another regexp ??

you want to use a variable to select the named url? eg a variable containing 'webgui.views.music' ? — Anentropic
– Anentropic, Commented Oct 13, 2014 at 16:29
according to docs that is possible docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/ref/templates/builtins/#url — Anentropic
– Anentropic, Commented Oct 13, 2014 at 16:30
No. Like this in Django URLs doc : url(r'^articles/(?P<year>\d{4})/$', 'news.views.year_archive'), , except I don't know the length variable.. Thanks for the link. — Isador
– Isador, Commented Oct 13, 2014 at 16:35
I don't understand what is your question... are you just trying to work out the correct regex in the url for accepting an artist name? — Anentropic
– Anentropic, Commented Oct 13, 2014 at 16:37
This is very unclear. artist.name is already a variable. What exactly are you trying to do? — Daniel Roseman
– Daniel Roseman, Commented Oct 13, 2014 at 16:37

gcerar · Accepted Answer · 2014-10-13 17:57:53Z

3

Instead of using

url(r'^music/(\d+)/$', 'webgui.views.music'),

because d+ stands for digits, you should use

url(r'^music/?P<artist_name>[a-zA-Z0-9 \'&-]/$', 'webgui.views.music')

Don't forget to modify function

def whatever_named_it(request, artist_name):
    ...

Update: In template you should use

{% url 'webgui.views.music' artist_name=artist.name %}

because we are using named arguments.

Extra: If you are going to allow any text for artist's name, I would recommend you using slug to avoid spaces in URL. That would make it better to read, search engine friendly and avoid of insane user input. When programming web-app never trust user input ... ever.

For "slugified" name urls would be:

url(r'^music/(?P<slug>[\w-]+)/$', 'webgui.views.music')

edited Oct 13, 2014 at 17:57

answered Oct 13, 2014 at 16:30

gcerar

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5 Comments

Louis Over a year ago

[a-zA-Z0-9 \'&-] is extremely ethnocentric as a regular expression to capture names.

Isador Over a year ago

Thank you, gcerar, it was about I've asked. But it doesn't works (NoReverseMatch), and I'm not sure it will be my final solution.

gcerar Over a year ago

Isador, can you try url(r'^music/(?P<artist_name>[a-zA-Z0-9 \'&-])/$', 'webgui.views.music') instead and report if it's working?

Isador Over a year ago

The same :

Exception Value: 	  Reverse for 'webgui.views.music' with arguments '(u'Anathema',)' and keyword arguments '{}' not found. 1 pattern(s) tried: ["music/(?P<artist_name>[a-zA-Z0-9 \\'&-])/$"]

gcerar Over a year ago

Ooooh right. Sorry I forgot we used named argument. In template replace {% url 'webgui.views.music' artist.name %} with {% url 'webgui.views.music' artist_name=artist.name %}. I think that should do it.

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