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Development with Django is not always a walk in the park, and the most efficient way to deal with common issues is to learn about them before they happen to you.
To that end, here is a quick overview of the kinds of conundrums you are likely to encounter in your work with Django so that you are prepared to nip them in the bud rapidly.
Struggling with n+1 queries
Queries that suffer from the n+1 issue are prone to loop around when a list of results is generated, creating additional queries for each result retrieved.
This is obviously bad for performance, and so identifying n+1 queries in Django is a priority if you want to make sure that your database is well optimized.
Battling the backup process
Creating regular backups so that you have restore points available if disaster strikes is essential, and yet it can be a pain for developers to implement, because until you actually need a backup to bring back functionality and retrieve lost data, it feels like unnecessary extra work.
Even so, sticking to a rigorous maintenance and continuity plan is crucial. Embracing automation to avoid the time-consuming and mind-numbing aspects of this is also a good idea.
Enabling observability
All projects need to be monitored and overseen for as long as they are live and being used. Vigilance will let you spot problems sooner and implement fixes quicker.
Of course you need to adopt the right tools for the job at hand, and be willing to use them to check up on performance persistently. Even the most robustly designed apps and services can suffer snafus, so don’t get complacent.
Securing scalability
Working within the Django framework does give you opportunities to scale your project and enable it to encompass bigger and better things further down the line.
The issue is that if you are worrying about scalability from day one, you may find that there are so many other choices to make, integrations to consider and hurdles to overcome at every step of the way.
It is arguably better to put scalability on the backburner to an extent, so that you are not encumbered by indecision before a project has even got off the ground. As and when it grows to the point that you need to start looking into how it will scale, then you can act, and be glad that you have built something which is demonstrably successful and useful enough to take to the next level.
Succumbing to sprawl
Beginning with a blank slate and endeavoring to make all of your code neat, tidy and efficient is a noble ambition. But every developer knows that the more a project progresses, the greater the complexity, which brings with it inevitable messiness.
This can be frustrating in its own right, and you might feel compelled to start from scratch after making a lot of progress simply because nothing is tidy and buttoned-down. However, this level of perfectionism is ultimately counterproductive, and will be more time and effort invested in what is ultimately a fruitless task.
Instead, don’t get disheartened by the loose ends which arise as a project evolves, but rather work with them to conquer new challenges.
Dealing with documentation
Lastly, the need to document processes and procedures as part of your Django development duties is a frustration in its own right. And yet this is also necessary to ensure the resilience and longevity of a project, especially if you will not always be on hand to intervene when bugs arise or outages strike.
Documentation is not the most glamorous aspect of development, but it has to be done right to protect your creations.
