Provide samples for using Python Connector with Django

[jackwotherspoon]

Django is one of the most widely used Python web frameworks. We should look at providing samples on how to connect to a Cloud SQL database using the Python Connector and Django.

What makes this a more difficult feat is that the default Django backend for Postgres is psycopg2 and for MySQL is mysqlclient or mysql-connector-python, which are not currently supported with the Python Connector.

• Django Postgres
• Django MySQL

[hadim]

Any ETA on this?

[jackwotherspoon]

@hadim I can't really provide a precise ETA as of right now, it most likely won't be until early 2023. I have begun playing around with usage of the Python Connector and Django as is currently. However, if development work is needed to add support within Django for the Python Connector I won't be able to get around to it until the new year.

If anyone here has had experience in leveraging the Python Connector with Django I'm more than happy to hear about their feedback/experience to update the Python Connector documentation accordingly with a code sample.

Will ping this thread with any updates moving forward.

[stiangrim]

Any updates on this?

[jackwotherspoon]

Hi @stiangrim, I've begun trying to find elegant workarounds to using the Cloud SQL Python Connector with Django as I hope to avoid having to write Django backend(s) to support the Python Connector.

In the meantime if you or anyone else has had any luck feel free to post your finding here! I'm sure others would benefit greatly 😃

[danielroseman]

I don't know about doing it without writing a Django backend, but it turned out to be super easy to write one that supports the connector. In my case, since I was only targeting MySQL, I put this into a cloudsql/base.py file in my project:

from django.db.backends.mysql import base
from google.cloud.sql.connector import Connector


class DatabaseWrapper(base.DatabaseWrapper):
    def get_new_connection(self, conn_params):
        return Connector().connect(**conn_params)

and then with a DATABASES setting like this:

DATABASES = {
  "default": {
    "ENGINE": "cloudsql",
    "USER": "...",
    "PASSWORD": "...",
    "NAME": "...",
    "OPTIONS": {
      "driver": "pymysql",
      "instance_connection_string": "project:region:instance"
    }
}
import pymysql
pymysql.install_as_MySQLdb()

it Just Worked. (The install_as_MySQLdb is needed as Django doesn't support PyMySQL out of the box; if the connector starts supporting mysqlclient, as proposed elsewhere, we can switch to that and this can go away.)

Happy to contribute this as a PR to the docs.

[jackwotherspoon]

@danielroseman That is great news! 👏

Would be greatly appreciated if you could put up a PR adding this to the frameworks section of our README, we'd love to showcase this solution for others 😄