I've been coding in Python for a profession since 1995 and have over the years developed several web frameworks. They could never compete with Django, Pylons, Rails, Nitrogen, etc, but since they were my own I always found it easier to use them. Now, just recently, I got several important web applications to build. The first one was a casino. So I thought it's time try something new and use one of the big frameworks. The casino was going to be a rewrite of a python casino I developed for Caesars in 1995. So I had to choose one of the python frameworks. I've already done some work in TurboGears (and Zope is for other things...) so that left me Django and Pylons. I bought The Definitive Guide to Pylons (Expert's Voice in Web Development) and The Definitive Guide to Django: Web Development Done Right. I read both from cover to cover twice over but I knew from the first few chapters that Pylons and Gardner had won. Why? The Pylons book really gave me something. I came away from it full of enthusiasm to program in Pylons!

"The Definitive Guide to Django" is a weak but not bad book. On the Django frame work itself it adds little to what you can get from reading the web site documentation. The examples don't really develop typical web development problems: DB schema changes and migration, Complex DB interaction, Site security, (How do you add data or subclass Djangos user ?), Ajax, testing, and releasing, interfacing to payment systems, etc.
Chapter 14 - "Other Contributed Frameworks" was nice, but you don't buy a book for just one chapter, or do you ? So if you want to have the Django web site documentation in a book The Definitive Guide to Django: Web Development Done Right is for you, otherwise it offers nothing much more.

But what ever you do, DON'T make the mistake of buying Pro Django (Expert's Voice in Web Development). You see, I didn't want to condemn Django on just the reading of one book, so I went out and bought "Pro Django" which is unreadable. In fact whenever we need a laugh we read sections of this SCIgen masterpiece out load in the office!

Great book, the Django version 1.0 has been released yet this book still use the old one, so some samples didn't work.

But still a good book if you want to start develop web apps using django.

This is a great book if you are completely new to web development but already know your way around python.

I have spent the last year trying to find a platform to work on. The last two places I worked had two different platforms that I did not want to use (ColdFusion & Java), for reasons I will not bother you with. I knew I had to find a new platform/language to do my own development in and so I went looking. I tried RoR, PHP & stumbled upon Python (thank you Google I/O). Python led me to Django and I could not be happier. This platform/language is not for everyone (which is?), but I find it to be an excellent development platform for quick web development.

This is an excellent book for learning Django web development. Not a book full of examples and how to build a store, bookmark or social application. It is meant for readers who have a background in programming and hopefully web programming. If so the concepts are not new, just the framework.

The book does not dive into Python, except to show how to use the language in the context of Django. The book does not have an example application that you build upon through each chapter (which is a common practice with introductions to new programming languages/frameworks), but rather goes through the various components of Django, what they mean, how they work and briefly how to use them.

If you learn through building then Learning Website Development with Django: A beginner's tutorial to building web applications, quickly and cleanly, with the Django application framework (From Technologies to Solutions) is a better book for you. If you want to learn Python the language then Learning Python, 3rd Edition is a better book for you. If you want an introduction to Django then this is the best book I have found.

My problem with this book is that the author has tarnished his integrity with me in that he was, as the head of the development of the Django software project, cognizant of the fact that he would be releasing a book on a subject that he would be changing very shortly (and making his book soon out of date).

I bought the book and because it was so quickly out of date I feel ripped off. In my opinion, it shouldn't be sold any more - at least not without complete instructions of which SVN revision numbers of each piece of software/modules used in the examples in 'this' book.

Please wait for the second edition if you want to learn about Django from the horse's mouth. Otherwise, research the other volumes available on Amazon and purchase it/them.