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Django with Python 3 and MySQL database

Django with Python 3 and MySQL database

I read many folks are having problems using MySQL db driver with Python 3, especially when setting up a Django app. The default Django 1.6.5 is only supporting the MySQLdb driver and that only works with Python 2.

I have been using mysql-connector-python package with Python 3 and it has built-in django support as well. I had ran into trouble like this http://bugs.mysql.com/bug.php?id=73232, but it is fixed now with the latest mysql-connector-python 1.2.3 release. The mysql-connector-python also works with Python 2.7 as well, and its a pure python library without native code, which makes the install much easier.

When installing mysql-connector-python, ensure you allow external hosted files like this

pip install --allow-all-external mysql-connector-python

If you are behind a firewall, use the proxy option

pip install --proxy my_proxy_server --allow-all-external mysql-connector-python

With these, now you can set your Django settings.py file with MySQL engine

DATABASES = {
    default: {
        ENGINE: mysql.connector.django,
        NAME: mydb,
        USER: myuser,
        PASSWORD: mypassword,
    }
}

PS: My initial testing with Django 1.7 also works pretty well with mysql-connector-python. How sweet!

UPDATE 07/15/2015:
The django 1.8 documentation now recommends using mysqlclient package if you want to use Python3 with MySQL backend. It should be a drop in replacement for MySQLdb.