Awesome
django-sass
The absolute simplest way to use Sass with Django. Pure Python, minimal dependencies, and no special configuration required.
Status
Python Package | |
Build |
Installation
- Install from pip.
pip install django-sass
- Add to your
INSTALLED_APPS
(you only need to do this in a dev environment, you would not want this in your production settings file, although it adds zero overhead):
INSTALLED_APPS = [
...,
'django_sass',
]
- Congratulations, you're done 😀
Usage
In your app's static files, use Sass as normal. The only difference is that
you can not traverse upwards using ../
in @import
statements. For example:
app1/
|- static/
|- app1/
|- scss/
|- _colors.scss
|- app1.scss
app2/
|- static/
|- app2/
|- scss/
|- _colors.scss
|- app2.scss
In app2.scss
you could reference app1's and app2's _colors.scss
import as so:
@import 'app1/scss/colors';
@import 'app2/scss/colors';
// Or since you are in app2, you can reference its colors with a relative path.
@import 'colors';
Then to compile app2.scss
and put it in the css
directory,
run the following management command (the -g
will build a source map, which
is helpful for debugging CSS):
python manage.py sass app2/static/app2/scss/app2.scss app2/static/app2/css/app2.css -g
Or, you can compile the entire scss
directory into
a corresponding css
directory. This will traverse all subdirectories as well:
python manage.py sass app2/static/app2/scss/ app2/static/app2/css/
In your Django HTML template, reference the CSS file as normal:
{% load static %}
<link href="{% static 'app2/css/app2.css' %}" rel="stylesheet">
✨✨ Congratulations, you are now a Django + Sass developer! ✨✨
Now you can commit those CSS files to version control, or run collectstatic
and deploy them as normal.
For an example project layout, see testproject/
in this repository.
Watch Mode
To have django-sass
watch files and recompile them as they change (useful in
development), add the --watch
flag.
python manage.py sass app2/static/app2/scss/ app2/static/app2/css/ --watch
Example: deploying compressed CSS to production
To compile minified CSS, use the -t
flag to specify compression level (one of:
"expanded", "nested", "compact", "compressed"). The default is "expanded" which
is human-readable.
python manage.py sass app2/static/app2/scss/ app2/static/app2/css/ -t compressed
You may now optionally commit the CSS files to version control if so desired,
or omit them, whatever fits your needs better. Then run collectsatic
as normal.
python manage.py collectstatic
And now proceed with deploying your files as normal.
Limitations
-
@import
statements must reference a path relative to a path inSTATICFILES_FINDERS
(which will usually be an app'sstatic/
directory or some other directory specified inSTATICFILES_DIRS
). Or they can reference a relative path equal to or below the current file. It does not support traversing up the filesystem (i.e.../
).Legal imports:
@import 'file-from-currdir'; @import 'subdir/file'; @import 'another-app/file';
Illegal imports:
@import '../file';
-
Only supports
-g
,-p
, and-t
options similar topysassc
. Ideallydjango-sass
will be as similar as possible to thepysassc
command line interface.
Feel free to file an issue or make a pull request to improve any of these limitations. 🐱💻
Why django-sass?
Other packages such as
django-libsass and
django-sass-processor, while
nice packages, require django-compressor
which itself depends on several other
packages that require compilation to install.
Installing django-compressor
in your production web server requires a LOT of
extra bloat including a C compiler. It then will compile the Sass on-the-fly
while rendering the HTML templates. This is a wasteful use of CPU on your web
server.
Instead, django-sass
lets you compile the Sass locally on your machine
before deploying, to reduce dependencies and CPU time on your production web
server. This helps keep things fast and simple.
- If you simply want to use Sass in development without installing a web of
unwanted dependencies, then
django-sass
is for you. - If you don't want to deploy any processors or compressors to your production
server, then
django-sass
is for you. - If you don't want to change the way you reference and serve static files,
then
django-sass
is for you. - And if you want the absolute simplest installation and setup possible for
doing Sass,
django-sass
is for you too.
django-sass only depends on libsass (which provides pre-built wheels for Windows, Mac, and Linux), and of course Django (any version).
Programmatically Compiling Sass
You can also use django-sass
in Python to programmatically compile the sass.
This is useful for build scripts and static site generators.
from django_sass import compile_sass
# Compile scss and write to output file.
compile_sass(
inpath="/path/to/file.scss",
outpath="/path/to/output.css",
output_style="compressed",
precision=8,
source_map=True
)
For more advanced usage, you can specify additional sass search paths outside
of your Django project by using the include_paths
argument.
from django_sass import compile_sass, find_static_paths
# Get Django's static paths.
dirs = find_static_paths()
# Add external paths.
dirs.append("/external/path/")
# Compile scss and write to output file.
compile_sass(
inpath="/path/to/file.scss",
outpath="/path/to/output.css",
output_style="compressed",
precision=8,
source_map=True,
include_paths=dirs,
)
Contributing
To set up a development environment, first check out this repository, create a venv, then:
(myvenv)$ pip install -r requirements-dev.txt
Before committing, run static analysis tools:
(myvenv)$ black .
(myvenv)$ flake8
(myvenv)$ mypy
Then run the unit tests:
(myvenv)$ pytest
Changelog
1.1.0
- New: Now compiles
.sass
files as well as.scss
files. - Fix bug when input path is a file and output path does not exist.
1.0.1
- Maintanence release, no functional changes.
- Add additional type hints within the codebase.
- Tested against Django 3.1
- Formatted code with
black
.
1.0.0
- New: You can now use
django_sass
APIs directly in Python. - Added unit tests.
- Code quality improvements.
0.2.0
- New feature:
-g
option to build a source map (when input is a file, not a directory).
0.1.2
- Fix: Write compiled CSS files as UTF-8.
- Change: Default
-p
precision from 5 to 8 for better support building Bootstrap CSS.
0.1.1
- Fix: Create full file path if not exists when specifying a file output.
0.1.0
- Initial release