/docs/releases/1.1-alpha-1.txt
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1================================ 2Django 1.1 alpha 1 release notes 3================================ 4 5February 23, 2009 6 7Welcome to Django 1.1 alpha 1! 8 9This is the first in a series of preview/development releases leading up to the 10eventual release of Django 1.1, currently scheduled to take place in April 2009. 11This release is primarily targeted at developers who are interested in trying 12out new features and testing the Django codebase to help identify and resolve 13bugs prior to the final 1.1 release. 14 15As such, this release is *not* intended for production use, and any such use is 16discouraged. 17 18What's new in Django 1.1 alpha 1 19================================ 20 21ORM improvements 22---------------- 23 24Two major enhancements have been added to Django's object-relational mapper 25(ORM): 26 27Aggregate support 28~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 29 30.. currentmodule:: django.db.models 31 32It's now possible to run SQL aggregate queries (i.e. ``COUNT()``, ``MAX()``, 33``MIN()``, etc.) from within Django's ORM. You can choose to either return the 34results of the aggregate directly, or else annotate the objects in a 35:class:`QuerySet` with the results of the aggregate query. 36 37This feature is available as new :meth:`QuerySet.aggregate()`` and 38:meth:`QuerySet.annotate()`` methods, and is covered in detail in :doc:`the ORM 39aggregation documentation </topics/db/aggregation>` 40 41Query expressions 42~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 43 44Queries can now refer to a another field on the query and can traverse 45relationships to refer to fields on related models. This is implemented in the 46new :class:`F` object; for full details, including examples, consult the 47:ref:`documentation for F expressions <query-expressions>`. 48 49Performance improvements 50------------------------ 51 52.. currentmodule:: django.test 53 54Tests written using Django's :doc:`testing framework </topics/testing>` now run 55dramatically faster (as much as 10 times faster in many cases). 56 57This was accomplished through the introduction of transaction-based tests: when 58using :class:`django.test.TestCase`, your tests will now be run in a transaction 59which is rolled back when finished, instead of by flushing and re-populating the 60database. This results in an immense speedup for most types of unit tests. See 61the documentation for :class:`TestCase` and :class:`TransactionTestCase` for a 62full description, and some important notes on database support. 63 64Other improvements 65------------------ 66 67Other new features and changes introduced since Django 1.0 include: 68 69* The :doc:`CSRF protection middleware </ref/contrib/csrf>` has been split into 70 two classes -- ``CsrfViewMiddleware`` checks incoming requests, and 71 ``CsrfResponseMiddleware`` processes outgoing responses. The combined 72 ``CsrfMiddleware`` class (which does both) remains for 73 backwards-compatibility, but using the split classes is now recommended in 74 order to allow fine-grained control of when and where the CSRF processing 75 takes place. 76 77* :func:`~django.core.urlresolvers.reverse` and code which uses it (e.g., the 78 ``{% url %}`` template tag) now works with URLs in Django's administrative 79 site, provided that the admin URLs are set up via ``include(admin.site.urls)`` 80 (sending admin requests to the ``admin.site.root`` view still works, but URLs 81 in the admin will not be "reversible" when configured this way). 82 83* The ``include()`` function in Django URLconf modules can now accept sequences 84 of URL patterns (generated by ``patterns()``) in addition to module names. 85 86* Instances of Django forms (see :doc:`the forms overview </topics/forms/index>`) 87 now have two additional methods, ``hidden_fields()`` and ``visible_fields()``, 88 which return the list of hidden -- i.e., ``<input type="hidden">`` -- and 89 visible fields on the form, respectively. 90 91* The ``redirect_to`` generic view (see :doc:`the generic views documentation 92 </ref/generic-views>`) now accepts an additional keyword argument 93 ``permanent``. If ``permanent`` is ``True``, the view will emit an HTTP 94 permanent redirect (status code 301). If ``False``, the view will emit an HTTP 95 temporary redirect (status code 302). 96 97* A new database lookup type -- ``week_day`` -- has been added for ``DateField`` 98 and ``DateTimeField``. This type of lookup accepts a number between 1 (Sunday) 99 and 7 (Saturday), and returns objects where the field value matches that day 100 of the week. See :ref:`the full list of lookup types <field-lookups>` for 101 details. 102 103* The ``{% for %}`` tag in Django's template language now accepts an optional 104 ``{% empty %}`` clause, to be displayed when ``{% for %}`` is asked to loop 105 over an empty sequence. See :doc:`the list of built-in template tags 106 </ref/templates/builtins>` for examples of this. 107 108The Django 1.1 roadmap 109====================== 110 111Before Django 1.1 goes final, several other preview/development releases will be 112made available. The current schedule consists of at least the following: 113 114* Week of *March 20, 2009:* Django 1.1 beta 1, at which point Django 1.1 will 115 be in "feature freeze": no new features will be implemented for 1.1 116 past that point, and all new feature work will be deferred to 117 Django 1.2. 118 119* Week of *April 2, 2009:* Django 1.1 release candidate. At this point all 120 strings marked for translation must freeze to allow translations to 121 be submitted in advance of the final release. 122 123* Week of *April 13, 2009:* Django 1.1 final. 124 125If deemed necessary, additional alpha, beta or release candidate packages will 126be issued prior to the final 1.1 release. 127 128What you can do to help 129======================= 130 131In order to provide a high-quality 1.1 release, we need your help. Although this 132alpha release is, again, *not* intended for production use, you can help the 133Django team by trying out the alpha codebase in a safe test environment and 134reporting any bugs or issues you encounter. The Django ticket tracker is the 135central place to search for open issues: 136 137 * http://code.djangoproject.com/timeline 138 139Please open new tickets if no existing ticket corresponds to a problem you're 140running into. 141 142Additionally, discussion of Django development, including progress toward the 1431.1 release, takes place daily on the django-developers mailing list: 144 145 * http://groups.google.com/group/django-developers 146 147... and in the ``#django-dev`` IRC channel on ``irc.freenode.net``. If you're 148interested in helping out with Django's development, feel free to join the 149discussions there. 150 151Django's online documentation also includes pointers on how to contribute to 152Django: 153 154 * :doc:`How to contribute to Django </internals/contributing>` 155 156Contributions on any level -- developing code, writing documentation or simply 157triaging tickets and helping to test proposed bugfixes -- are always welcome and 158appreciated. 159 160Development sprints for Django 1.1 will also be taking place at PyCon US 2009, 161on the dedicated sprint days (March 30 through April 2), and anyone who wants to 162help out is welcome to join in, either in person at PyCon or virtually in the 163IRC channel or on the mailing list.