# Django 1.8.18.dev20170123152445 documentation

# Writing custom django-admin commands

Applications can register their own actions with `manage.py`. For example, you might want to add a `manage.py` action for a Django app that you’re distributing. In this document, we will be building a custom `closepoll` command for the `polls` application from the tutorial.

To do this, just add a `management/commands` directory to the application. Django will register a `manage.py` command for each Python module in that directory whose name doesn’t begin with an underscore. For example:

    polls/
        __init__.py
        models.py
        management/
            __init__.py
            commands/
                __init__.py
                _private.py
                closepoll.py
        tests.py
        views.py

On Python 2, be sure to include `__init__.py` files in both the `management` and `management/commands` directories as done above or your command will not be detected.

In this example, the `closepoll` command will be made available to any project that includes the `polls` application in `INSTALLED_APPS`.

The `_private.py` module will not be available as a management command.

The `closepoll.py` module has only one requirement – it must define a class `Command` that extends `BaseCommand` or one of its subclasses.

Standalone scripts

Custom management commands are especially useful for running standalone scripts or for scripts that are periodically executed from the UNIX crontab or from Windows scheduled tasks control panel.

To implement the command, edit `polls/management/commands/closepoll.py` to look like this:

    from django.core.management.base import BaseCommand, CommandError
    from polls.models import Poll

    class Command(BaseCommand):
        help = 'Closes the specified poll for voting'

        def add_arguments(self, parser):
            parser.add_argument('poll_id', nargs='+', type=int)

        def handle(self, *args, **options):
            for poll_id in options['poll_id']:
                try:
                    poll = Poll.objects.get(pk=poll_id)
                except Poll.DoesNotExist:
                    raise CommandError('Poll "%s" does not exist' % poll_id)

                poll.opened = False
                poll.save()

                self.stdout.write('Successfully closed poll "%s"' % poll_id)

Before Django 1.8, management commands were based on the `optparse` module, and positional arguments were passed in `*args` while optional arguments were passed in `**options`. Now that management commands use `argparse` for argument parsing, all arguments are passed in `**options` by default, unless you name your positional arguments to `args` (compatibility mode). You are encouraged to exclusively use `**options` for new commands.

Note

When you are using management commands and wish to provide console output, you should write to `self.stdout` and `self.stderr`, instead of printing to `stdout` and `stderr` directly. By using these proxies, it becomes much easier to test your custom command. Note also that you don’t need to end messages with a newline character, it will be added automatically, unless you specify the `ending` parameter:

    self.stdout.write("Unterminated line", ending='')

The new custom command can be called using `python manage.py closepoll <poll_id>`.

The `handle()` method takes one or more `poll_ids` and sets `poll.opened` to `False` for each one. If the user referenced any nonexistent polls, a `CommandError` is raised. The `poll.opened` attribute does not exist in the tutorial and was added to `polls.models.Poll` for this example.

## Accepting optional arguments

The same `closepoll` could be easily modified to delete a given poll instead of closing it by accepting additional command line options. These custom options can be added in the `add_arguments()` method like this:

    class Command(BaseCommand):
        def add_arguments(self, parser):
            # Positional arguments
            parser.add_argument('poll_id', nargs='+', type=int)

            # Named (optional) arguments
            parser.add_argument('--delete',
                action='store_true',
                dest='delete',
                default=False,
                help='Delete poll instead of closing it')

        def handle(self, *args, **options):
            # ...
            if options['delete']:
                poll.delete()
            # ...

Previously, only the standard `optparse` library was supported and you would have to extend the command `option_list` variable with `optparse.make_option()`.

The option (`delete` in our example) is available in the options dict parameter of the handle method. See the `argparse` Python documentation for more about `add_argument` usage.

In addition to being able to add custom command line options, all management commands can accept some default options such as `--verbosity` and `--traceback`.

## Management commands and locales

By default, the `BaseCommand.execute()` method deactivates translations because some commands shipped with Django perform several tasks (for example, user-facing content rendering and database population) that require a project-neutral string language.

In previous versions, Django forced the “en-us” locale instead of deactivating translations.

If, for some reason, your custom management command needs to use a fixed locale, you should manually activate and deactivate it in your `handle()` method using the functions provided by the I18N support code:

    from django.core.management.base import BaseCommand, CommandError
    from django.utils import translation

    class Command(BaseCommand):
        ...
        can_import_settings = True

        def handle(self, *args, **options):

            # Activate a fixed locale, e.g. Russian
            translation.activate('ru')

            # Or you can activate the LANGUAGE_CODE # chosen in the settings:
            from django.conf import settings
            translation.activate(settings.LANGUAGE_CODE)

            # Your command logic here
            ...

            translation.deactivate()

Another need might be that your command simply should use the locale set in settings and Django should be kept from deactivating it. You can achieve it by using the `BaseCommand.leave_locale_alone` option.

When working on the scenarios described above though, take into account that system management commands typically have to be very careful about running in non-uniform locales, so you might need to:

- Make sure the `USE_I18N` setting is always `True` when running the command (this is a good example of the potential problems stemming from a dynamic runtime environment that Django commands avoid offhand by deactivating translations).
- Review the code of your command and the code it calls for behavioral differences when locales are changed and evaluate its impact on predictable behavior of your command.

## Testing

Information on how to test custom management commands can be found in the testing docs.

## Command objects

class `BaseCommand`

The base class from which all management commands ultimately derive.

Use this class if you want access to all of the mechanisms which parse the command-line arguments and work out what code to call in response; if you don’t need to change any of that behavior, consider using one of its subclasses.

Subclassing the `BaseCommand` class requires that you implement the `handle()` method.

### Attributes

All attributes can be set in your derived class and can be used in `BaseCommand`’s subclasses.

`BaseCommand.``args`

  A string listing the arguments accepted by the command, suitable for use in help messages; e.g., a command which takes a list of application names might set this to ‘<app_label app_label ...>’.

  Deprecated since version 1.8: This should be done now in the `add_arguments()` method, by calling the `parser.add_argument()` method. See the `closepoll` example above.

`BaseCommand.``can_import_settings`

  A boolean indicating whether the command needs to be able to import Django settings; if `True`, `execute()` will verify that this is possible before proceeding. Default value is `True`.

`BaseCommand.``help`

  A short description of the command, which will be printed in the help message when the user runs the command `python manage.py help <command>`.

`BaseCommand.``missing_args_message`

  If your command defines mandatory positional arguments, you can customize the message error returned in the case of missing arguments. The default is output by `argparse` (“too few arguments”).

`BaseCommand.``option_list`

  This is the list of `optparse` options which will be fed into the command’s `OptionParser` for parsing arguments.

  Deprecated since version 1.8: You should now override the `add_arguments()` method to add custom arguments accepted by your command. See the example above.

`BaseCommand.``output_transaction`

  A boolean indicating whether the command outputs SQL statements; if `True`, the output will automatically be wrapped with `BEGIN;` and `COMMIT;`. Default value is `False`.

`BaseCommand.``requires_system_checks`

  A boolean; if `True`, the entire Django project will be checked for potential problems prior to executing the command. If `requires_system_checks` is missing, the value of `requires_model_validation` is used. If the latter flag is missing as well, the default value (`True`) is used. Defining both `requires_system_checks` and `requires_model_validation` will result in an error.

`BaseCommand.``requires_model_validation`

  Deprecated since version 1.7: Replaced by `requires_system_checks`

  A boolean; if `True`, validation of installed models will be performed prior to executing the command. Default value is `True`. To validate an individual application’s models rather than all applications’ models, call `validate()` from `handle()`.

`BaseCommand.``leave_locale_alone`

  A boolean indicating whether the locale set in settings should be preserved during the execution of the command instead of being forcibly set to ‘en-us’.

  Default value is `False`.

  Make sure you know what you are doing if you decide to change the value of this option in your custom command if it creates database content that is locale-sensitive and such content shouldn’t contain any translations (like it happens e.g. with django.contrib.auth permissions) as making the locale differ from the de facto default ‘en-us’ might cause unintended effects. Seethe Management commands and locales section above for further details.

  This option can’t be `False` when the `can_import_settings` option is set to `False` too because attempting to set the locale needs access to settings. This condition will generate a `CommandError`.

`BaseCommand.``style`

  An instance attribute that helps create colored output when writing to `stdout` or `stderr`. For example:

      self.stdout.write(self.style.NOTICE('...'))

  See Syntax coloring to learn how to modify the color palette and to see the available styles (use uppercased versions of the “roles” described in that section).

  If you pass the `--no-color` option when running your command, all `self.style()` calls will return the original string uncolored.

### Methods

`BaseCommand` has a few methods that can be overridden but only the `handle()` method must be implemented.

Implementing a constructor in a subclass

If you implement `__init__` in your subclass of `BaseCommand`, you must call `BaseCommand`’s `__init__`:

    class Command(BaseCommand):
        def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs):
            super(Command, self).__init__(*args, **kwargs)
            # ...

`BaseCommand.``add_arguments`(parser)

  Entry point to add parser arguments to handle command line arguments passed to the command. Custom commands should override this method to add both positional and optional arguments accepted by the command. Calling `super()` is not needed when directly subclassing `BaseCommand`.

`BaseCommand.``get_version`()

  Returns the Django version, which should be correct for all built-in Django commands. User-supplied commands can override this method to return their own version.

`BaseCommand.``execute`(*args, **options)

  Tries to execute this command, performing system checks if needed (as controlled by the `requires_system_checks` attribute). If the command raises a `CommandError`, it’s intercepted and printed to stderr.

Calling a management command in your code

`execute()` should not be called directly from your code to execute a command. Use call_command instead.

`BaseCommand.``handle`(*args, **options)

  The actual logic of the command. Subclasses must implement this method.

  It may return a Unicode string which will be printed to `stdout` (wrapped by `BEGIN;` and `COMMIT;` if `output_transaction` is `True`).

`BaseCommand.``check`(app_configs=None, tags=None, display_num_errors=False)

  Uses the system check framework to inspect the entire Django project for potential problems. Serious problems are raised as a `CommandError`; warnings are output to stderr; minor notifications are output to stdout.

  If `app_configs` and `tags` are both `None`, all system checks are performed. `tags` can be a list of check tags, like `compatibility` or `models`.

`BaseCommand.``validate`(app=None, display_num_errors=False)

  Deprecated since version 1.7: Replaced with the `check` command

  If `app` is None, then all installed apps are checked for errors.

### BaseCommand subclasses

class `AppCommand`

A management command which takes one or more installed application labels as arguments, and does something with each of them.

Rather than implementing `handle()`, subclasses must implement `handle_app_config()`, which will be called once for each application.

`AppCommand.``handle_app_config`(app_config, **options)

  Perform the command’s actions for `app_config`, which will be an `AppConfig` instance corresponding to an application label given on the command line.

Previously, `AppCommand` subclasses had to implement `handle_app(app, **options)` where `app` was a models module. The new API makes it possible to handle applications without a models module. The fastest way to migrate is as follows:

    def handle_app_config(app_config, **options):
        if app_config.models_module is None:
            return                                  # Or raise an exception.
        app = app_config.models_module
        # Copy the implementation of handle_app(app_config, **options) here.

However, you may be able to simplify the implementation by using directly the attributes of `app_config`.

class `LabelCommand`

A management command which takes one or more arbitrary arguments (labels) on the command line, and does something with each of them.

Rather than implementing `handle()`, subclasses must implement `handle_label()`, which will be called once for each label.

`LabelCommand.``handle_label`(label, **options)

  Perform the command’s actions for `label`, which will be the string as given on the command line.

class `NoArgsCommand`

Deprecated since version 1.8: Use `BaseCommand` instead, which takes no arguments by default.

A command which takes no arguments on the command line.

Rather than implementing `handle()`, subclasses must implement `handle_noargs()`; `handle()` itself is overridden to ensure no arguments are passed to the command.

`NoArgsCommand.``handle_noargs`(**options)

  Perform this command’s actions

### Command exceptions

class `CommandError`

Exception class indicating a problem while executing a management command.

If this exception is raised during the execution of a management command from a command line console, it will be caught and turned into a nicely-printed error message to the appropriate output stream (i.e., stderr); as a result, raising this exception (with a sensible description of the error) is the preferred way to indicate that something has gone wrong in the execution of a command.

If a management command is called from code through call_command, it’s up to you to catch the exception when needed.