How to consume RESTful APIs with Django - the easiest way
Introduction
A REST API defines a set of functions which developers can perform requests and receive responses via HTTP protocol such as GET, POST, PUT and DELETE
Think REST API as a web service that provides you the data you want to use in your application(mobile or front-end client).
The key components for a REST API request are:
GET — The most common option, returns some data from the API based on the given endpoint.
POST — Creates a new record and add it to the database.
PUT — Update an existing record.
DELETE — Deletes the record on the given endpoint.
In this guide, we will use JSONPlaceholder API.
The final project Here
Setting up
Create a new virtual environment
mkdir use_rest_api_with_django && cd use_rest_api_with_django
virtualenv venv
Activate our virtual environment
source /ven/bin/activate
Install Django and requests Library
pip install Django requests
Create a new Django project from the terminal
django-admin startproject consume_restful_api .
Don't forget to put the dot(.) at the end.
Create a simple Django application
python manage.py startapp main_app
Register our newly created app
# settings.py
INSTALLED_APPS = [
'django.contrib.admin',
'django.contrib.auth',
'django.contrib.contenttypes',
'django.contrib.sessions',
'django.contrib.messages',
'django.contrib.staticfiles',
'main_app.apps.MainAppConfig' # add this
]
Change the templates directory
# settings.py
TEMPLATES = [
{
'BACKEND': 'django.template.backends.django.DjangoTemplates',
'DIRS': [os.path.join(BASE_DIR, 'templates')], # add this
'APP_DIRS': True,
'OPTIONS': {
'context_processors': [
'django.template.context_processors.debug',
'django.template.context_processors.request',
'django.contrib.auth.context_processors.auth',
'django.contrib.messages.context_processors.messages',
],
},
},
]
Inside the views.py file add this
# views.py
import requests
from django.shortcuts import render
def home(request):
# get the list of todos
response = requests.get('https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/todos/')
# transfor the response to json objects
todos = response.json()
return render(request, "main_app/home.html", {"todos": todos})
Create the required templates
mkdir templates && mkdir templates/main_app
touch templates/base.html && touch templates/main_app/home.html
base.html
<!-- base.html -->
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8" />
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" />
<title>How to consume RESTful APIs with Django</title>
</head>
<body>
<h2>How to consume RESTful APIs with Django</h2>
{% block content %} {% endblock content %}
</body>
</html>
home.html
<!-- base.html -->
{% extends "base.html" %} {% block content %}
<ul>
{% for todo in todos %}
<li>{{ todo.id }} - {{ todo.title }}</li>
{% endfor %}
</ul>
{% endblock content %}
Let's add some styling with bootstrap
Change the base.html file
<!-- base.html -->
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8" />
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0" />
<link
rel="stylesheet"
href="https://stackpath.bootstrapcdn.com/bootstrap/4.4.1/css/bootstrap.min.css"
integrity="sha384-Vkoo8x4CGsO3+Hhxv8T/Q5PaXtkKtu6ug5TOeNV6gBiFeWPGFN9MuhOf23Q9Ifjh"
crossorigin="anonymous"
/>
<title>How to consume RESTful APIs with Django</title>
</head>
<body>
<h2 class="text-center">How to consume RESTful APIs with Django</h2>
<div class="container">
{% block content %} {% endblock content %}
</div>
</body>
</html>
And home.html
<!-- home.html -->
{% extends "base.html" %}
{% block content %}
<div class="col-md-6 col-auto">
<div class="card">
<div class="card-header">
Todos
</div>
<ul class="list-group list-group-flush">
{% for todo in data %}
<li class="list-group-item">{{ todo.id }} - {{ todo.title }}</li>
{% endfor %}
</ul>
</div>
</div>
{% endblock content %}
Conclusion
In this article, we've learned how to consume RESTful APIs with Django and Python requests Library.
