django-insights 0.1.3

Django Insights

Features

Create insights for your app, store them in a SQLite database for further processing, these insights are written right next to your application logic.

Installation

Installing with:

pip install 'django-insights'

Usage

First create 1 or more insights.py file(s) in your app directory, for example:

project
└── testapp
    └── insights.py

In these insights files your write out any metric you would like to track. Eacht metric starts with a question and some values to store. Below is a example of the @metrics.counter function:

# project/testapp/insights.py
from django_insights.metrics import metrics
from project.testapp.models import Author


@metrics.counter(question="How many authors are there?")
def count_authors() -> int:
    return Author.objects.count()

Add django_insights package, insights database and router to your settings

INSTALLED_APPS = [
    ...
    "django_insights",
]


DATABASES = {
    ...
    "insights": {"ENGINE": "django.db.backends.sqlite3", "NAME": "db/insights.db"},
    ...
}

DATABASE_ROUTERS = ['django_insights.database.Router']

Note: please make sure you exclude the database in your .gitignore file

Migrate insights database:

workon myapp
python manage.py migrate insights --database=insights

Now collect your insights

python manage.py collect_insights

You now have a database containing all insights from your application. You can inspect this database yourself with sqlite3 db/insights.db - or - you can use the Django Insights dashboard.

To enable this dashboard, add the following settings:

from django.urls import include, path

urlpatterns = [
    path(
        '/insights',
        include('django_insights.urls', namespace='insights'),
    ),
]

Now you can visit https://localhost:8000/insights to inspect your Django Insights database

Settings

# Custom app name
INSIGHTS_APP_NAME = "Bezamon"

# Menu translation
INSIGHTS_MENU = {'project.testapp.insights': 'Books'}

# Quality of chart images
INSIGHTS_CHART_DPI = 180

# Change primary color
INSIGHTS_CHART_PRIMARY_COLOR = "#336699"

Background

I'm currently working at a small company that is in the process of renewing some parts of our product. To gain insight into the usage over different periods, we have tried a few solutions. We initially attempted to periodically generate CSV files from queries, as well as send data to a dashboard at regular intervals.

We ended up with many exports that where spread out over multiple people. Additionally, exporting data directly from the database also posed a security risk, as it required constant movement of possible sensitive information. After several months of working with CSV files, which were often outdated and required conversion by other (paid) tools, we where looking for a better solution.

I wanted an easy-to-configure file within our various apps that would allow me to create "insights" easily, so Django Insights was born. I decided to switch to a local SQLite database which could be share on request, as a plus these files can be tracked by a security officer.

Documentation

Write more about where to find documentation

Ideas

• Connect to other datasources and export to different file-formats ( ArrowFile?, NDJSON )

Is it any good?

Yes.

License

The MIT License