Flat page URLs send broken-link emails when SEND_BROKEN_LINK_EMAILS set to true

[Matt]

When SEND_BROKEN_LINK_EMAILS is set to true in a ​project's settings file, an email is sent to site managers even when a ​flat page is retreived.

[James Bennett]

I wonder if this isn't dependent on the order of middleware classes; do you still see this if you have FlatpageFallbackMiddleware listed before CommonMiddleware (since in that case the flatpage middleware should catch the request and prevent a 404 from being raise before CommonMiddleware sends the email)?

[Matt]

I have FlatpageFallbackMiddleware listed above all other middleware classes (purely by accident I think), so order doesn't seem to affect this. My middleware classes are ordered as follows:

MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES = (
    'django.contrib.flatpages.middleware.FlatpageFallbackMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.sessions.middleware.SessionMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.auth.middleware.AuthenticationMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.common.CommonMiddleware',
    'django.middleware.doc.XViewMiddleware',
    'django.contrib.redirects.middleware.RedirectFallbackMiddleware',
)

[Chris Beaven]

Sounds like a bug to me.

[Marc Fargas <telenieko@…>]

This ticket was opened one year ago, could somebody confirm it? I've looked at the code and there's no reason why FlatPages should be returning a 404 to the next middleware.

[orestis@…]

I've seen this too, it does happen when the flatpages middleware is at the top of the list.

The docs specify that the flatpage middleware should be last, as it is a last resort. However, elsewhere, it is noted that the response middleware is evaluated in reverse order. So I think this is what makes this confusing. If you put the flatpage middleware last on the list, it's response function is processed first and CommonMiddleware isn't run.

I think the flatpage docs should be changed to tell you that the flatpage middleware should be placed *AFTER* the CommonMiddleware, in order to prevent this from happening.

So, for the OP: Move the flatpages middleware after CommonMiddleware.

[Simon G. <dev@…>]

Ok, I'm closing this as invalid as it appears to be a docs issue w.r.t middleware ordering and not the flatpages app.