List View - Function based Views Django

A List View is used to show multiple records from a database, such as posts, products, or users.

• Retrieves all required records from the database.
• Passes the data to a template for rendering.
• Displays the records in a clear format like a list or table.
• Provides an easy way to show collections of items on a page.

Example: Consider a project named 'geeksforgeeks' having an app named 'geeks'. After creating the project and app, the next step is to create a model, whose records will be displayed using the List View.

Step 1: Define a Model

In geeks/models.py:

from django.db import models

class GeeksModel(models.Model):
    title = models.CharField(max_length=200)
    description = models.TextField()

    def __str__(self):
        return self.title

Step 2: Apply Migrations

Run the following commands to create the corresponding database table

python manage.py makemigrations
python manage.py migrate

Step 3: Create Sample Data

Use Django's shell to create model instances:

python manage.py shell

Enter following commands in shell:

from geeks.models import GeeksModel

GeeksModel.objects.create(title="title1", description="description1")
GeeksModel.objects.create(title="title2", description="description2")
GeeksModel.objects.create(title="title3", description="description3")

Now we have everything ready for back end. To verify that instances have been created, exit the shell using exit() command and run the development server using this command:

python manage.py runserver

After running the command, visit the development url: http://127.0.0.1:8000/

Step 4: Create the List View

In geeks/views.py, define a function-based view to fetch and render the model instances:

from django.shortcuts import render
from .models import GeeksModel

def list_view(request):
    context = {
        "dataset": GeeksModel.objects.all()
    }
    return render(request, "list_view.html", context)

Step 5: Create the Template

In templates/list_view.html, add the following HTML to display the data:

<div class="main">
    {% for data in dataset %}
        <h3>{{ data.title }}</h3>
        <p>{{ data.description }}</p>
        <hr/>
    {% endfor %}
</div>

Run the development server and visit the URL http://127.0.0.1:8000/ to see the list view in action.

Output:

Sorting the List (Descending Order)

You can order the results in reverse (newest first) by modifying the view:

def list_view(request):
    context = {
        "dataset": GeeksModel.objects.all().order_by("-id")
    }
    return render(request, "list_view.html", context)

order_by("-id"): sorts the items in descending order of their ID.

Output:

Filtering the List

You can also filter the data shown in the list view. For example, let’s add a new entry:

Launch the shell using the below command:

python manage.py shell 

Enter the following commands in shell:

from geeks.models import GeeksModel

GeeksModel.objects.create(title = "Naveen", description = "GFG is Best").save()

To display only items with the word “title” in their title, update the view:

def list_view(request):
    context = {
        "dataset": GeeksModel.objects.filter(title__icontains="title")
    }
    return render(request, "list_view.html", context)

title__icontains="title" filters entries whose title contains the word "title", case-insensitively.

Run the development server and visit the URL http://127.0.0.1:8000/ again to see the filtered output.

Suggested Quiz

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3 Questions

What does a function-based List View in Django typically do?

• A

  Shows a form to create a new record

• B

  Deletes all records of a model

• C

  Displays multiple records from a model in a list or table

• D

  Redirects to another URL

Explanation:

A List View fetches all (or filtered) objects from the database and renders them in a template for display.

In a function-based List View, which code snippet correctly obtains all objects from a model named MyModel?

• A

  dataset = MyModel.objects.all()

• B

  dataset = MyModel.get_all()

• C

  dataset = MyModel.objects.filter()

• D

  dataset = MyModel.objects.list()

Explanation:

objects.all() returns a QuerySet of all instances of MyModel, which can then be passed to template context.

After fetching objects in a List View, how is the data typically sent to the template for rendering?

• A

  Using redirect()

• B

  Using render(request, template_name, context) with context containing the dataset

• C

  Printing dataset directly to console

• D

  Returning HttpResponse(dataset)

Explanation:

The view sends the data via context dict to the template so that template engine can display each item in list format.

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