MediaTemple, Python and Django

Just installing Django on my Mediatemple dv account.

First, log in to SSH as root user. Then use subversion, provided by mediatemple in

WebControl > Root Access & Developer Tools > Install Developer Tools,

which must at some point be enabled to be accessible. Following this,

Subversion grabs the latest version to /var/trunk/django.

In the case of dv accounts, python packages are located in /usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages

Create a symbolic link between these two locations using

ln -s /var/trunk/django /usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages

then add another symbolic link to bring the underlying python script to the root of the django trunk:

ln -s /var/trunk/django/bin/django-admin.py /usr/local/bin

Basically, what is happening here is:

Django Source /var/trunk : Subversion project root

\ --> accessible to /usr/lib : Libraries for programming and packages
\ --> accessible to /usr/local : Local hierarchy

More on this. Now:

import django

and


django.version

voila!

Next, you must add the MySQLdb interface for python if you are planning to use mySQL as your cms database. Here's a good reference for once you have the tarball in your directory. However, I'd rather wget it directly from the sourceforge site. Here is the command to use from root SSH:

wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/mysql-python/MySQL-python-1.2.2.tar.gz

Works fine. Now install the module and it should run without an error.