Day 15 Django Learning : Deploy

#django #learning #webdev #beginners

🚀 Django Learning Journey – Day 15

🎉 My first ever Django project is officially LIVE on the internet!
Today feels incredibly special — the anxiety, the errors, the retries… everything was worth it.

🛠️ Fixing “DisallowedHost” & Diving Into Deployment

The day started with the intimidating “DisallowedHost at /” error.
But that error pushed me into learning so much more:

🧠 What “hosts” actually mean in Django

🌱 Why production environments care about allowed URLs

🔐 And how environment variables work in real-world apps

That’s when I discovered python-dotenv.
Installed it → created my .env → moved sensitive settings inside it.
A small step, but a big leap in understanding real project structure.

📦 Preparing for Deployment

One of the biggest takeaways today:

pip freeze > requirements.txt

This single command saved me from dependency nightmares during deployment.

To make things clean & reliable:

Reinstalled gunicorn

Added whitenoise to serve static files

Updated settings.py (yes… I left an extra comma at the end initially 😅)

Created a proper Procfile → web: gunicorn todo_app.wsgi

Then pushed everything to GitHub → cleared the build cache → clicked deploy.

🌐 The AWE moment

When Render said “Build Successful”, my heart was racing.
Clicked the link…
And there it was — MY app. Live. On the actual internet.

To double-check, I asked a friend to test.
He posted “Atun” just to troll me 😂
And the app worked flawlessly.

This feeling?
Inexplicable. Unreal. Motivating.
Exactly the kind of moment that makes all the struggles worth it.

📝 Looking Back: 15 Days of Learning

14 days ago, deployment felt far away.
I even planned for 14 days… but finished on Day 15.
Not bad for a first project — and a journey full of:

Errors

Debugging

Rethinking

Googling

Trying again

And again

I documented the journey not just to share successes, but to show the struggles too.
If even one learner finds courage from this — I’ll be happy.

🔐 Next Stop: Authentication + User Dashboards

For my second project, I’ll build:

User authentication

Individual user dashboards

Better UI/UX

New logic

Cleaner, more scalable structure

This journey has only begun. Django is deep, powerful, and exciting.

💬 Tell me your story!

What was your reaction when you first saw your project live?
Did you scream? Celebrate? Panic? Refresh your browser 20 times like me? 😄
Would love to hear it in the comments.

❤️ Thank You

To everyone supporting, encouraging, and guiding me — thank you.
Stay tuned — I’m soon sharing a full list of all commands I used, from start → deployment. Might help someone out there.