===========
Page models
===========
Each page type (a.k.a Content type) in Wagtail is represented by a Django model. All page models must inherit from the :class:`wagtail.wagtailcore.models.Page` class.
As all page types are Django models, you can use any field type that Django provides. See `Model field reference `_ for a complete list of field types you can use. Wagtail also provides :class:`~wagtail.wagtailcore.fields.RichTextField` which provides a WYSIWYG editor for editing rich-text content.
.. topic:: Django models
If you're not yet familiar with Django models, have a quick look at the following links to get you started:
`Creating models `_
`Model syntax `_
An example Wagtail page model
=============================
This example represents a typical blog post:
.. code-block:: python
from django.db import models
from modelcluster.fields import ParentalKey
from wagtail.wagtailcore.models import Page, Orderable
from wagtail.wagtailcore.fields import RichTextField
from wagtail.wagtailadmin.edit_handlers import FieldPanel, MultiFieldPanel, InlinePanel
from wagtail.wagtailimages.edit_handlers import ImageChooserPanel
from wagtail.wagtailsearch import index
class BlogPage(Page):
# Database fields
body = RichTextField()
date = models.DateField("Post date")
feed_image = models.ForeignKey(
'wagtailimages.Image',
null=True,
blank=True,
on_delete=models.SET_NULL,
related_name='+'
)
# Search index configuraiton
search_fields = Page.search_fields + (
index.SearchField('body'),
index.FilterField('date'),
)
# Editor panels configuration
content_panels = Page.content_panels + [
FieldPanel('date'),
FieldPanel('body', classname="full"),
InlinePanel('related_links', label="Related links"),
]
promote_panels = [
MultiFieldPanel(Page.promote_panels, "Common page configuration"),
ImageChooserPanel('feed_image'),
]
# Parent/sub page type rules
parent_page_types = ['blog.BlogIndex']
subpage_types = []
class BlogPageRelatedLink(Orderable):
page = ParentalKey(BlogPage, related_name='related_links')
name = models.CharField(max_length=255)
url = models.URLField()
panels = [
FieldPanel('name'),
FieldPanel('url'),
]
.. tip::
To keep track of ``Page`` models and avoid class name clashes, it can be helpful to suffix model class names with "Page" e.g BlogPage, ListingIndexPage.
Writing page models
===================
Here we'll describe each section of the above example to help you create your own page models.
Database fields
---------------
Each Wagtail page type is a Django model, which are each represented in the database as a table.
Each page type can have its own set of fields. For example, a news article may have body text and a published date whereas an event page may need separate fields for venue and start/finish times.
In Wagtail, you can use any Django field class. Most field classes provided by `third party apps `_ should work as well.
Wagtail provides a couple of field classes of its own as well:
- ``RichTextField`` - For rich text content
- ``StreamField`` - A block-based content field (see: :doc:`/topics/streamfield`)
For tagging, Wagtail fully supports `django-taggit `_ so we recommend using that.
Search
------
The ``search_fields`` attribute defines which fields are added to the search index and how they are indexed.
This should be set to a tuple, of ``SearchField`` and ``FilterField`` objects. ``SearchField`` adds a field for full-text search. ``FilterField`` adds a field for filtering the results. A field can be indexed with both ``SearchField`` and ``FilterField`` at the same time (but only one instance of each).
In the above example, we've indexed ``body`` for full-text search and ``date`` for filtering.
The arguments that these field types accept are documented `here `_.
Editor panels
-------------
There are a few attributes for defining edit panels on a page model. Each represents the list of panels on their respective tabs in the page editor interface.
- ``content_panels`` - For content, such as main body text
- ``promote_panels`` - For metadata, such as tags, thumbnail image and SEO title
- ``settings_panels`` - For settings, such as publish date
Each of these attributes is set a list of ``EditHandler`` objects which defines which fields appear on which tabs and how they are structured on each tab.
Here's a summary of the ``EditHandler`` classes that Wagtail provides out of the box. See :doc:`/reference/pages/panels` for full descriptions.
**Basic**
These allow editing of model fields, the ``FieldPanel`` class will choose the correct widget based on the type of the field. ``StreamField`` fields need to use a specialised panel class.
- :class:`~wagtail.wagtailadmin.edit_handlers.FieldPanel`
- :class:`~wagtail.wagtailadmin.edit_handlers.StreamFieldPanel`
**Structural**
These are used for structuring fields in the interface.
- :class:`~wagtail.wagtailadmin.edit_handlers.MultiFieldPanel` - For grouping similar fields together
- :class:`~wagtail.wagtailadmin.edit_handlers.InlinePanel` - For inlining child models
- :class:`~wagtail.wagtailadmin.edit_handlers.FieldRowPanel` - For organising multiple fields into a single row
**Chooser**
``ForeignKey`` fields to certain models can use one of the below ``ChooserPanel`` classes. These add a nice modal-based chooser interface (and the image/document choosers also allow uploading new files without leaving the page editor).
- :class:`~wagtail.wagtailadmin.edit_handlers.PageChooserPanel`
- :class:`~wagtail.wagtailimages.edit_handlers.ImageChooserPanel`
- :class:`~wagtail.wagtaildocs.edit_handlers.DocumentChooserPanel`
- :class:`~wagtail.wagtailsnippets.edit_handlers.SnippetChooserPanel`
.. note::
In order to use one of these choosers, the model being linked to must either be a page, image, document or snippet.
Linking to any other model type is currently unsupported, you should use ``FieldPanel`` which will create a dropdown box.
Customising the page editor interface
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The page editor can be customised further. See :doc:`/advanced_topics/customisation/page_editing_interface`.
Parent/sub page type rules
--------------------------
These two attributes allow you to control where page types may be used in your site. It allows you to define rules like "blog entries may only be created under a blog index".
Both take a list of model classes or model names. Model names are of the format ``app_label.ModelName``. If the ``app_label`` is omitted, the same app is assumed.
- ``parent_page_types`` limits which page types this types can be created under
- ``subpage_types`` limits which page types that can be created under this type
By default, any page type can be created under any page type and it is not necessary to set these attributes if that's the desired behaviour.
Setting ``parent_page_types`` to an empty list is a good way of preventing a particular page type from being created in the editor interface.
Template rendering
==================
Each page model can be given a HTML template which is rendered when a user browses to a page on the site frontend. This is the simplest and most common way to get Wagtail content to end users (but not the only way).
Adding a template for a page model
----------------------------------
Wagtail automatically chooses a name for the template based on the app label and model class name.
Format: ``/.html``
For example, the template for the above blog page will be: ``blog/blog_page.html``
You just need to create a template in a location where it can be accessed with this name.
Template context
----------------
Wagtail renders templates with the ``self`` variable bound to the page instance being rendered. Use this access the content of the page. For example, to get the title of the current page, do ``{{ self.title }}``. All variables provided by `context processors `_ are also available.
Customising template context
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
All pages have a ``get_context`` method that is called whenever the template is rendered and returns a dictionary of variables to bind into the template.
To add more variables to the template, override this method on the page model class:
.. code-block:: python
class BlogIndexPage(Page):
...
def get_context(self, request):
# Call default get_context method
context = super(BlogIndexPage, self).get_context(request)
# Add extra variables and return the updated context
context['blog_entries'] = BlogPage.objects.child_of(self).live()
return context
The variables can then be used in the template:
.. code-block:: HTML+Django
{{ self.title }}
{% for entry in blog_entries %}
{{ entry.title }}
{% endfor %}
Changing the template
---------------------
Set ``template`` attribute on the class to change the template:
.. code-block:: python
class BlogPage(Page):
...
template = 'other_template.html'
Dynamically choosing the template
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The template can be changed on a per-instance basis by defining a ``get_template`` method on the page class:
.. code-block:: python
class BlogPage(Page):
...
use_other_template = models.BooleanField()
def get_template(self, request):
if self.use_other_template:
return 'blog/other_blog_page.html'
return 'blog/blog_page.html'
In this example, pages that have the ``use_other_template`` boolean field set will use the ``other_blog_page.html`` template. All other pages will use the default ``blog/blog_page.html``.
More control over page rendering
--------------------------------
The default behaviour of rendering a template when a user visits a page can be completely overriden.
All page classes have a ``serve()`` method, that internally calls the ``get_context`` and ``get_template`` methods and renders the template. This method is similar to a Django view function, taking a Django ``Request`` object and returning a Django ``Response`` object.
For example, this can be overriden to make the ``BlogPage`` model respond with a JSON representation of itself:
.. code-block:: python
from django.http import JsonResponse
class BlogPage(Page):
...
def serve(self, request):
return JsonResponse({
'title': self.title,
'body': self.body,
'date': self.date,
# Resizes the image to 300px width and gets a URL to it
'feed_image': self.feed_image.get_rendition('width-300').url,
})
Inline models
=============
Wagtail can nest the content of other models within the page. This is useful for creating repeated fields, such as related links or items to display in a carousel. Inline model content is also versioned with the rest of the page content.
Each inline model requires the following:
- It must inherit from :class:`wagtail.wagtailcore.models.Orderable`
- It must have a ``ParentalKey`` to the parent model
.. note:: django-modelcluster and ParentalKey
The model inlining feature is provided to by `django-modelcluster `_ and the ``ParentalKey`` field type must be imported from there:
..code-block:: python
from modelcluster.fields import ParentalKey
``ParentalKey`` is a subclass of Django's ``ForeignKey`` and takes the same arguments
For example, the following inline model can be used to add related links (a list of name, url pairs) to the ``BlogPage`` model:
.. code-block:: python
from django.db import models
from modelcluster.fields import ParentalKey
from wagtail.wagtailcore.models import Orderable
class BlogPageRelatedLink(Orderable):
page = ParentalKey(BlogPage, related_name='related_links')
name = models.CharField(max_length=255)
url = models.URLField()
panels = [
FieldPanel('name'),
FieldPanel('url'),
]
To add this to the admin interface, use the :class:`~wagtail.wagtailadmin.edit_handlers.InlinePanel` edit panel class:
.. code-block:: python
content_panels = [
...
InlinePanel('related_links', label="Related links"),
]
The first argument must match the value of the ``related_name`` attribute of the ``ParentalKey``.
Database representation
=======================
Querying pages
==============
TODO: In these two sections, we must describe multi-table inheritance...
NOTE: The reason I renamed this to "page models" is because I think it would be a good place to also describe "general usage" of pages, such as finding the specific object, the url or overriding the template/template context. I think that things like creating pages programmatically probably should be documented elsewhere but linked to from here.
Tips
====
Friendly model names
--------------------
Make your model names more friendly to users of Wagtail using Django's internal ``Meta`` class with a ``verbose_name`` e.g
.. code-block:: python
class HomePage(Page):
...
class Meta:
verbose_name = "homepage"
When users are given a choice of pages to create, the list of page types is generated by splitting your model names on each of their capital letters. Thus a ``HomePage`` model would be named "Home Page" which is a little clumsy. ``verbose_name`` as in the example above, would change this to read "Homepage" which is slightly more conventional.
Page QuerySet ordering
----------------------
``Page``-derived models *cannot* be given a default ordering by using the standard Django approach of adding an ``ordering`` attribute to the internal ``Meta`` class.
.. code-block:: python
class NewsItemPage(Page):
publication_date = models.DateField()
...
class Meta:
ordering = ('-publication_date', ) # will not work
This is because ``Page`` enforces ordering QuerySets by path. Instead you must apply the ordering explicitly when you construct a QuerySet:
.. code-block:: python
news_items = NewsItemPage.objects.live().order_by('-publication_date')
Page custom managers
--------------------
``Page`` enforces its own 'objects' manager in its ``__init__`` method, so you cannot add a custom manager at the 'objects' attribute.
.. code-block:: python
class EventPageQuerySet(PageQuerySet):
def future(self):
return self.filter(
start_date__gte=timezone.localtime(timezone.now()).date()
)
class EventPage(Page):
start_date = models.DateField()
objects = EventPageQuerySet.as_manager() # will not work
To use a custom manager you must choose a different attribute name. Make sure to subclass ``wagtail.wagtailcore.models.PageManager``.
.. code-block:: python
from django.db import models
from django.utils import timezone
from wagtail.wagtailcore.models import Page, PageManager
class FutureEventPageManager(PageManager):
def get_queryset(self):
return super().get_queryset().filter(
start_date__gte=timezone.localtime(timezone.now()).date()
)
class EventPage(Page):
start_date = models.DateField()
future_events = FutureEventPageManager()
Then you can use ``EventPage.future_events`` in the manner you might expect.