Deploy Django Project into Windows Server using IIS and FastCGI¶

• Reference
• How to manage static files in django

Prepare Python env and IIS¶

Python Environment Setting¶

• According to author's experience, python 3.9.x is not compatible with FastCGI, therefore we need to re-create a conda env with python==3.8

• And then, we need reinstall the required library, in a case you do not generate requirements.txt, we do it one by one here

• wfastcgi provides a bridge between IIS and Python using WSGI and FastCGI

  conda create -n py38 python==3.8
  conda activate py38
  pip install django
  pip install django-allauth
  pip install django-crispy-forms
  pip install crispy-bootstrap4
  pip install jwt
  pip install et-xmlfile
  pip install requests
  pip install urllib3
  pip install wfastcgi
  pip install pillow
  

Django Project Setting¶

• Remember to change Debug model to False and add Host IP into your django_project.settings.py
• Set STATIC_URL, STATIC_ROOT, MEDIA_URL, MEDIA_ROOT

  • Don't put any static files in the STATIC_ROOT directory. That's where the static files get copied to automatically after you run collectstatic.

  • Instead, always put them in the directories associated with the STATICFILES_DIRS setting or <APP_NAME>/static/.

    #django_project.settings.py
    ...
    DEBUG = False
    ALLOWED_HOSTS = ['*']
    ...
    STATIC_URL = "static/"
    MEDIA_URL = '/media/'
    STATIC_ROOT = os.path.join(BASE_DIR,'static')
    MEDIA_ROOT = os.path.join(BASE_DIR,'media')
    ...
    

Install IIS¶

1. Search Turn Windows features on or off, check Internet Information Services and Internet Information Services Hostable Web Core

2. Goto Internet Information Services > World Wide Web Services > Application Development Features, CheckCGI

   

3. Click OK to apply this setting, and restart your machine to activate it.

Verify the IIS Installation¶

• Open a web browser on the server, goto http://localhost/.You should see the default IIS page.

  

Configure IIS¶

Option 1: Configure FastCGI using IIS¶

1. Click on the name of the server in the list on the left. Double-click the FastCGI Settings icon

   

2. Under Actions on the right-hand side click Add application …

   

3. In the Add FastCGI Application dialog, in the Full Path box, type the path to the Python env we just created, and In the Arguments input box, type the path to the wfastcgi.py file in the site-packages

   

4. Under the General section, click on the Environment Variables line, then click the gray … button that appears next to (Collection) on the right-hand side of the line.

   1. Add DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE with value {Your_Django_Project_name}.settings
   2. Add PYTHONPATH with value {Your_Django_Project_Path}
   3. Add WSGI_HANDLER with value {Your_Django_Project_name}.wsgi.application

Create and Configure a New IIS Web Site¶

Next, we need to create a new website in IIS for the Django application and add a Handler Mapping to the newly created website so that requests coming to the IIS website are passed off to the Django application for processing.

Create a new Web Site¶

1. Open IIS Manager, Right-click on the Sites folder and click Add Website …

   

2. For the site, name the project as you want. For the physical path, type the path to the project. Click OK.

   

Option 1: Set FastCGI Handler using IIS¶

Next, we’ll add a FastCGI handler mapping to this site so the requests coming into the site will be processed by the Django application.

1. In IIS Manager, expand the Sites folder on the left-hand side and click on the site. On the right, double-click Handler Mappings

   

2. On the right, under Actions, click Add Module Mapping

   

3. Fill out the form using your data

   1. D:\Anaconda3\envs\py38\python.exe|D:\Anaconda3\envs\py38\Lib\site-packages\wfastcgi.py

   

4. Click the Request Restrictions button and uncheck the Invoke handler only if the request is mapped to checkbox

   

Option 2: Set FastCGI Handler using web.config¶

• Microsoft tutorial

1. Build a web.config at under the same dir of {Your Django Project}, below is my web.config file

   <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
   <configuration>
       <system.webServer>
           <handlers>
               <add name="Python FastCGI" path="*" verb="*" modules="FastCgiModule" scriptProcessor="D:\Anaconda3\envs\py38\python.exe|D:\Anaconda3\envs\py38\Lib\site-packages\wfastcgi.py" resourceType="Unspecified" requireAccess="Script" />
           </handlers>
       </system.webServer>
   
       <appSettings>
           <add key="WSGI_HANDLER" value="django.core.wsgi.get_wsgi_application()" />
           <add key="DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE" value="django_project.settings" />
           <add key="PYTHONPATH" value="E:\2024\github\django-blog-project\django_project" />
       </appSettings>
   </configuration>
   

Load Static and Media file properly¶

Gather all static files and make a static virtual path¶

• Working with Static and Media Files in Django

1. run python manage.py collectstatic under your django project

   • It will generate admin under your static path, which contains all static files

   

2. Add Virtual Directory in your site

   

3. Fill the form using your static info

   

4. Put a web.config under your static folder

   <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
   <configuration>
      <system.webServer>
         <handlers>
               <clear />
               <add name="StaticFile" path="*" verb="*" modules="StaticFileModule" resourceType="File" requireAccess="Read" />
         </handlers>
      </system.webServer>
   </configuration>
   

Do the same for media¶

Check Result and Set Firewall¶

Check Result¶

• At this point everything should be working, so verify by loading the application in a browser.
• Open a browser on the server, Browse to http://localhost:{port number you set}

Configure the Windows Firewall¶

Possible Error¶

Python env issue¶

Error occurred while reading WSGI handler:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  ...
  File "D:\Anaconda3\envs\py38\lib\site-packages\django\apps\registry.py", line 83, in populate
    raise RuntimeError("populate() isn't reentrant")
RuntimeError: populate() isn't reentrant


StdOut: 

StdErr:

• open django/apps/registry.py, and around line 80, replace: raise RuntimeError("populate() isn't reentrant") with self.app_configs = {}
• This will allow Django to continue loading, and reveal the actual error.

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