Django Ikari

django-ikari is an application for anchoring configurable urlconfs to user configurable subdomains or domains to use in software-as-a-service projects.

Table of Contents

0. Roadmap
1. Installation
2. Settings
3. Models

• Permissions

4. Middleware
5. Views
6. Caching
7. Signals
8. URLs
9. Templates
10. License

0 Roadmap

As of 0.0.7 django-ikari is able to drop in and serve homepages for your user assigned domains/subdomains.

However, there are some critical aspects missing:

1. authenticate domain ownership, without which could lead to a denial of service by your other sass users. Ideally this would be either of: a. email verification sent to an address discovered via whois, or b. by prompting the user to modify/create a unique-hard-to-guess txt record on their dns server for the domain.
2. claim form and view, presented on the DoesNotExist error template when a user is logged in, triggering the behaviour in #1 above.

Non critical, but perhaps nice to have would be :

1. object level permissions: ensuring there is some consideration given towards django-guardian integration.

Finally some out of scope features that probably should be integrated at your projects level instead of here in the application:

1. themes and assets per site, subclassing the ikari.models.bases.BaseSite and associating any functionality/relationship to assets should occur there.
2. metrics and dashboard display, you can collect metrics via the ikari.signals.site_request then display them on a user dashboard that you more than likely already have.
3. organisation and site membership: django-organisations is great for this.

1 Installation

pip install django-ikari

In order to use application, add ikari' to INSTALLED_APPSin Django projectsettings.py' file, ikari.middleware.DomainsMiddleware' to MIDDLEWARE_CLASSESafterAuthenticationMiddleware', and configure application settings described in the next section.

2 Settings

IKARI_MASTER_DOMAIN

This needs to point at the domain of your main project, typically the place where you'd have forms that process payments, login users, process beta invites etc.

IKARI_ACCOUNT_URLCONF

routes which define paths to views to allow users to manage their site(s)

IKARI_SITE_URLCONF

routes that are anchored to the root of users sites. this urlconf will replace your ROOT_URLCONF setting when a requested hostname matches an active ( and published if the user is a site member) site.

IKARI_URL_ERROR_*

• IKARI_URL_ERROR_DOESNTEXIST
• IKARI_URL_ERROR_PRIVATE
• IKARI_URL_ERROR_INACTIVE
• IKARI_URL_ERROR_UNKNOWN

Url to redirect visitors to when they land on a subdomain that isn't linked to a ikari site.

IKARI_SUBDOMAIN_ROOT

if user defines a valid whole word then it is joined to this. Defaults to something like "."+IKARI_MASTER_DOMAIN

IKARI_SITE_MODEL

a python import path to your customised IkariSite model. you can subclass the abstract ikari.models.bases.SiteBase model as a good start.

Experimental Settings

IKARI_DOMAIN_VERIFICATION_BACKEND

a python import path to a verification backend that can be used to ensure the domain provided by the user satisfies your business logic.

IKARI_SITE_PERMISSION_GROUPS

Probably only relevant if you use the default provided ikari.models.default.Site class. Simply provides some role based permissions, although it is recommended that you use django-guardian and implement some action based permissions.

3 Models

Ikari ships with two default models, only one of which is required as defined above in your settings as IKARI_SITE_MODEL.

For the purpose of this section, "site urls" refers to the setting attribute IKARI_SITE_URLCONF.

You site model should at least have the following fields and methods:

• is_public, boolean. If True, then Anonymous users will be allowed to view the url routes in the "site urls". If False (default), DomainMiddleware will only allow the following instance of `auth.User':

  • is_staff=True or,
  • is_superuser=True, or
  • user in site.get_members()

• is_active, boolean. If False (default), DomainMiddleware will only allow any auth.User.is_staff or auth.User.is_superuser to access the "site urls"; if True, then site owners and other related users can also view the "site urls".

3.1 Permissions

• can_set_custom_domain' enables setting a domain which is not suffixed with the IKARI_SUBDOMAIN_ROOT` value.
• can_set_public_status' does the same for is_public' field.
• can_set_active_status' does the same for is_active' field.

4 Middleware

ikari.middleware.DomainsMiddleware' looks at request.get_host()and, if it matches anyikari.Site` model instance:

• sets request.ikari_site' to that instance (it can be later used by views and, with request` context processor, in templates);
• unless request.ikari_site.is_public' is true, it immediately logs out (and redirects to reverse URL lookup of settings.IKARI_URL_ERROR_PRIVATE) any auth.User` that does not satisfy this sites get_moderators() method;

• if IKARI_SITE_URLCONF' setting is set, sets request.urlconf' to its value, allowing single project to display different URL hierarchies for main site and account sites; WARNING: setting `request.urlconf' doesn't fit well with reverse URL lookups (those will still be made against root urlconf), django-debug-toolbar, and probably other things as well. For maximum reliability, consider running two separate projects on single database: one for "main" site, other for account domains, or use single urlconf for both;
• send signal ikari.signals.site_request' and if any receiver returns an instance of HttpResponse`, returns this response instead of actual page. This can be used for e.g. displaying error message and not allowing to log into expired accounts.

If current domain doesn't match any of existing ikari.Site instances and is not IKARI_MASTER_DOMAIN', middleware redirects user to IKARI_MASTER_DOMAIN'.

5 Views

• ikari.views.DomainErrorView : View used to render the templates for each of
  • IKARI_URL_ERROR_DOESNTEXIST
  • IKARI_URL_ERROR_PRIVATE
  • IKARI_URL_ERROR_INACTIVE
  • IKARI_URL_ERROR_UNKNOWN
• ikari.views.SiteHomeView : Main view to render an ikari.Site
• ikari.views.SiteUpdateView : Allows authorised users to update their site details.
• ikari.views.SiteCreateView : Allows authorised users to create their site.

6 Caching

I susgest you install and use django-johnny-cache with django-redis-cache

7 Signals

• ikari.signals.site_request: fired after default access rules satisfied but before delivery of site homepage
• ikari.signals.site_created: fired after a new ikari.Site is created.
• ikari.signals.site_updated: fired after an ikari.Site is updated.
• ikari.signals.site_deleted: fired after an ikari.Site is deleted.

8 URLs

ikari.urls.errors

Include this somewhere in your main site urlconf. example:

...
url(r'^sites/error/', include('ikari.urls.errors')),
...

ikari.urls.private

Include this somewhere in your main site urlconf. example:

...
url(r'^users/sites/', include('ikari.urls.private')),
...

ikari.urls.sites

The default urlconf which provides the ikari.views.SiteHomeView.

9 Templates

Ikari:

• ikari/site-update.html called by ikari.views.SiteUpdateView view. Receives two arguments:
  • Site - ikari.Site instance, and
  • form - forms.IkariSiteForm instance to display.
• ikari/site-create.html called by ikari.views.SiteCreateView view. Receives one argument, form, holding an instance of ikari.forms.IkariSiteForm.

10 License

This project is licensed on terms of GPL (GPL-LICENSE.txt) licenses.