Install and configure

  1. Install Django Instant:
pip install django-instant

Add to installed apps:

"corsheaders",
"instant",
  1. Install the websockets server

An installer is available for Linux only:

python3 manage.py installws

This will download the Centrifugo websockets server, install it and update your settings.py file with the appropriate configuration.

For other systems you have to install Centrifugo manually (use version 1 as this module is not compatible with Centrifugo 2 yet)

Settings

Configure the middleware:

MIDDLEWARE = [
   ...
   'corsheaders.middleware.CorsMiddleware',
   'django.middleware.common.CommonMiddleware',
   ...
]

Note: if you use the management command to install the server the settings below will already be configured.

# required settings
CENTRIFUGO_SECRET_KEY = "70b651f6-775a-4949-982b-b387b31c1d84" # the_key_that_is_in_config.json
SITE_SLUG = "my_site" # used internaly to prefix the channels
SITE_NAME = "My site"

CORS_ORIGIN_WHITELIST = ('localhost:8001',)

# optionnal settings
CENTRIFUGO_HOST = 'http://ip_here' #default: localhost
CENTRIFUGO_PORT = 8012 # default: 8001
CENTRIFUGO_PROXY = True # default: False - remove port from URL if you are behind a proxy.

By default the events are published using python. A go module is available to perform the publish operations in order to leave the main process alone as much as possible. This might be usefull when lots of messages are sent.

Note: when this option is enabled there is no error handling. This option is recommended when you need higher performance and don’t care about error messages.

You might have to make the instant/go/publish file executable with chmod

INSTANT_BROADCAST_WITH = 'go'

Performance test: 1000 messages:

  • Python: 2.96 seconds
  • Go: 1.41 seconds

10000 messages:

  • Python: 29.57 seconds
  • Go: 14.44 seconds

Note: this test uses the standard publish function so that each new event sent makes an new connection to Centrifugo.

Templates

Include the template {% include "instant/client.html" %} anywhere: nothing will be displayed it is the engine. See next section for messages handling.

Run the websockets server

If you used the installer:

python3 manage.py runws

Otherwise run the Centrifugo server normally

Frontend

A demo frontend is available. To use it:

pip install django-vitevue

Add “vv”, to installed apps

Set the urls:

from instant.views import instant_auth

urlpatterns = [
     # ...
     url(r'^centrifuge/auth/$', instant_auth, name='instant-auth'),
     url('^instant/', include('instant.urls')),
     ]

Login as superuser and go to /instant/