Django MEDIA not accessible

Question

My Django app is unable to see MEDIA directory. When I run one of my views I need to open a file. The scenario is to: take a record with requested id from data base get the file path to a file send the file to external server for OCR purposes urls.py from django.conf.urls.static import static urlpatterns = [ #my urls ] + static(settings.MEDIA_URL, document_root = settings.MEDIA_ROOT) models.py from django.db import models from django.contrib.auth.models import User class Homework( models.Model): title = models.CharField(max_length = 200, default = None) image = models.FileField(upload_to='user_scans/') author = models.ForeignKey(User, default=None, on_delete = models.CASCADE) latex = models.TextField(default = "No LaTeX Here") settings.py: from pathlib import Path from django.conf.urls.static import static BASE_DIR = Path(__file__).resolve().parent.parent ... DEBUG = True ... STATIC_ROOT = BASE_DIR / 'static' STATIC_URL = '/static/' MEDIA_ROOT = BASE_DIR / 'media' MEDIA_URL = "/media/" views.py import requests import json from django.shortcuts import render, get_object_or_404 from .models import Homework def create_homework(request): if request.method == 'GET': #some GET stuff if request.method == 'POST': homework = Homework() homework.title = title homework.image = image homework.author = author homework.save() id = homework.id json_to_mathsnip(id) .... def json_to_mathsnip(id): homework = get_object_or_404(Homework, pk=id) f = open(homework.image.url, "rb") ... some later stuff ... Unfortunately I'm constantly running into an error: FileNotFoundError at /homework/new [Errno 2] No such file or directory: '/media/user_scans/kwa.png' My main concern is I can access file from localhost:8000/media/user_scans/kwa.png and from admin panel. Requested file is saved properly: Also settings.py configuration seems to be in tact. What might be the issue? (env) $ pip freeze asgiref==3.5.0 backports.zoneinfo==0.2.1 certifi==2021.10.8 charset-normalizer==2.0.12 Django==4.0.1 idna==3.3 Pillow==9.0.0 psycopg2-binary==2.9.3 requests==2.27.1 sqlparse==0.4.2 urllib3==1.26.9 JavaScript questions and answers, JavaScript questions pdf, JavaScript question bank, JavaScript questions and answers pdf, mcq on JavaScript pdf, JavaScript questions and solutions, JavaScript mcq Test , Interview JavaScript questions, JavaScript Questions for Interview, JavaScript MCQ (Multiple Choice Questions)

Answer 1

This may not be the best way, but I tried it and it works. The bottom line is that when using the open() function with a relative path, such as /media/user_scans/kwa.png, then that file must be in the same directory as where the function is called. You could just find the absolute path of your image files in your computer, then append the filename to that and it will work, or you can do what I have below. import requests import json from django.shortcuts import render, get_object_or_404 from .models import Homework # ADD THESE import os from pathlib import Path def create_homework(request): if request.method == 'GET': #some GET stuff if request.method == 'POST': homework = Homework() homework.title = title homework.image = image homework.author = author homework.save() id = homework.id json_to_mathsnip(id) .... def json_to_mathsnip(id): homework = get_object_or_404(Homework, pk=id) # ADD THESE BASE_DIR = Path(__file__).resolve().parent.parent path_to_image_file = str(BASE_DIR) + homework.image.url f = open(path_to_image_file, "rb") ... some later stuff ... When you show an image in Django, or you access its url, it is a relative path, but the root is the url root, localhost:8000/, and the image url is appended to that, and Django manages to find the file (how exactly, I don't know). But the image file is in your computer, and that is what you want to open.