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## Django documentation

# The redirects app

Django comes with an optional redirects application. It lets you store simple redirects in a database and handles the redirecting for you.

## Installation

To install the redirects app, follow these two steps:

> 1. Add `"django.contrib.redirects"` to your INSTALLED_APPS setting.
> 2. Add `"django.contrib.redirects.middleware.RedirectFallbackMiddleware"` to your MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES setting.
> 3. Run the command `django-admin.py install redirects`.

## How it works

`django-admin.py install redirects` creates a `django_redirects` table in your database. This is a simple lookup table with `site_id`, `old_path` and `new_path` fields.

The `RedirectFallbackMiddleware` does all of the work. Each time any Django application raises a 404 error, this middleware checks the redirects database for the requested URL as a last resort. Specifically, it checks for a redirect with the given `old_path` with a site ID that corresponds to the SITE_ID setting.

> - If it finds a match, and `new_path` is not empty, it redirects to `new_path`.
> - If it finds a match, and `new_path` is empty, it sends a 410 ("Gone") HTTP header and empty (content-less) response.
> - If it doesn't find a match, the request continues to be processed as usual.

The middleware only gets activated for 404s -- not for 500s or responses of any other status code.

Note that the order of `MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES` matters. Generally, you can put `RedirectFallbackMiddleware` at the end of the list, because it's a last resort.

For more on middleware, read the middleware docs.

## How to add, change and delete redirects

### Via the admin interface

If you've activated the automatic Django admin interface, you should see a "Redirects" section on the admin index page. Edit redirects as you edit any other object in the system.

### Via the Python API

Redirects are represented by a standard Django model, which lives in django/contrib/redirects/models/redirects.py. You can access redirect objects via the Django database API.

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