python help() parsing problem for django.core.mail

[Michael VanLandingham <m.vanland@…>]

Error when accessing django.core.mail through python help()

EnvironmentError: Environment variable DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE is undefined 

In python help(), if I do:

help> django.core.mail

I get:

problem in django.core.mail - EnvironmentError: Environment variable DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE is undefined.

Other things in the django.core package display their docstrings and such.. It seems like something basic, but I didn't see anything obvious.

I'm on OS X 10.4.8, python 2.4.4, installed the source from the svn repository, e.g. 'python setup.py install'

[Chris Beaven]

I'd guess it's due to the following lines:

def send_mail(subject, message, from_email, recipient_list, fail_silently=False, auth_user=settings.EMAIL_HOST_USER, auth_password=settings.EMAIL_HOST_PASSWORD):

def send_mass_mail(datatuple, fail_silently=False, auth_user=settings.EMAIL_HOST_USER, auth_password=settings.EMAIL_HOST_PASSWORD):

It could be fixed rather easily by setting those default arguments inside of the functions if they're None. Alternately, you could just set the environment variable or use manage.py shell.

Marked as decision needed since it's pretty trivial. If someone who cared was to write up a patch, it may convince a committer to patch rather than close ;)

[anonymous]

The change suggested by SmileyChris is indeed the correct fix. We should never refer to settings.* in default arguments because it removes the ability to manually configure the settings (via settings.configure()), as well as causing problems as in this bug. Use None for the default argument (which is read at import time) and inside the function do test for None and replace it with the settings.XYZ value; we require settings to have already be configured in some fashion before actually executing any functions, so this is safe.

[Malcolm Tredinnick]

(Last comment was from me.)

[Per Jonsson <poj@…>]

I've written a patch that implements the suggestions in this ticket.

[Per Jonsson <poj@…>]

Realised when reading another ticket that the original patch didn't update the documentation in docs/email.txt

The new version fixes that problem.

[Jacob]

Fixed in [4574].