Django Rwanda Portal

Overview

Django Rwanda Portal is an open-source project designed to foster collaboration and knowledge sharing within the Django community in Rwanda. It provides a modular and scalable system built with Django, structured into reusable applications and layers for clean architecture, maintainability, and community-driven contributions.

The system emphasizes:

• Layered architecture for separation of concerns.

• Reusability & DRY principles.

• Community collaboration through well-documented code and contribution guidelines.

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Purpose

• Serve as a reference architecture for Django projects in Rwanda.

• Provide contributors a structured and organized system to learn from and extend.

• Implement real-world features like user management, posts, notifications, messaging, events, and media handling.

• Encourage collaboration, testing, and maintainability within the Django community.

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Project Structure

The project is organized into the following primary layers:

Layer / Directory	Purpose
src/api	API layer exposing versioned REST endpoints (v1/). Handles routing and schema definitions.
src/apps/*	Domain-specific applications (users, posts, analytics, messaging, notifications, media, comments, tags, events). Each app includes its own models, serializers, views, services, tests, etc.
src/common	Shared templates, static files, and reusable email templates.
src/config	Django project configuration (settings for dev, prod, staging, test), URL routing, WSGI/ASGI entry points, and Celery integration.
src/core	Core infrastructure utilities: database mixins, middleware, security helpers, constants, and exceptions.
docker/	Docker setup with Dockerfile, docker-compose.yml, and Nginx configuration.
infra/	Infrastructure-related configuration (future use for deployments).
scripts/	Automation scripts for project setup and maintenance.
docs/	Documentation for apps, layers, and developer guides.

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Getting Started

Prerequisites

Before contributing or running the project, ensure you have knowledge of or access to:

• Programming Languages: Python, JavaScript (vanilla)

• Frameworks & Libraries: Django, jQuery

• Databases & Caching: PostgreSQL, Redis

• Containerization & Deployment: Docker, docker-compose (Kubernetes or cloud providers like AWS/GCP/Azure optional)

• Python Dependencies: Defined in pyproject.toml and requirements.txt

• Package Managers: pip or uv

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Installation

Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/django-rwanda/django-rwanda-portal.git
cd django-rwanda-portal

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Install dependencies:

# using uv
uv sync

# or using pip
pip install -r requirements.txt

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Configure environment variables:

cp env/.env.example env/.env

Run migrations:

python src/manage.py makemigrations
python src/manage.py migrate

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Start the development server:

python src/manage.py runserver

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Using Docker (Optional)

To run the project with Docker:

docker-compose up --build

This sets up Django, PostgreSQL, and Nginx services.

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Contribution Guidelines

Before contributing, review:

• Code of Conduct

• Contributing Guidelines

Key practices:

• Work on feature branches, submit pull requests.

• Write tests for new features and bug fixes.

• Follow project coding standards (PEP8, type hints).

• Update documentation when introducing new modules or features.

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Documentation

• API Layer

• Apps – includes:

  • Users

  • Posts

  • Analytics

  • Comments

  • Events

  • Media

  • Messaging

  • Notifications

  • Tags

• Common Layer

• Config Layer

• Core Layer

• Development Guide

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License

This project is licensed under the MIT License

Copyright (c) 2025 I. Fils