Maintainer guide

This document is intended for maintainers of the template.

Automated updates

We use Dependabot to keep dependencies up-to-date, including Python packages, GitHub actions, npm packages, and Docker images.

GitHub Actions workflows

CI

ci.yml

The CI workflow runs on pushes to main and on pull requests. It covers two main aspects:

• Tests job: Runs pytest across Ubuntu, Windows, and macOS to validate template generation works correctly on all platforms.

• Docker job: Builds and tests Docker configurations for both the basic setup and with Celery enabled.

Issue manager

issue-manager.yml

Uses tiangolo/issue-manager to automatically close issues and pull requests after a delay when labeled appropriately.

Runs daily at 00:12 UTC, and also triggers on issue comments, issue labeling, and PR labeling.

Configured labels and their behavior (all with 10-day delay):

Label	Message
answered	Assuming the question was answered, this will be automatically closed now.
solved	Assuming the original issue was solved, it will be automatically closed now.
waiting	Automatically closing after waiting for additional info. To re-open, please provide the additional information requested.
wontfix	As discussed, we won’t be implementing this. Automatically closing.

UV lock regeneration

dependabot-uv-lock.yml

Automatically regenerates uv.lock when pyproject.toml changes in PRs from Dependabot or PyUp. This ensures the lock file stays in sync with dependency updates.

Triggers on:

• Pull requests that modify pyproject.toml (from dependabot[bot] or pyup-bot)

• Manual workflow dispatch

Align versions

align-versions.yml

Keeps version numbers synchronized across the template when Dependabot updates certain files. Runs the scripts/node_version.py and scripts/ruff_version.py scripts to propagate version changes.

Triggers on Dependabot PRs that modify:

• template/.nvmrc

• template/requirements/local.txt

Template testing

Copier Python API

Template tests use the Copier Python API directly:

# tests/test_copier_generation.py
from copier import run_copy

def test_project_generation(template_path, tmp_path, context):
    """Test template generation with default options."""
    run_copy(str(template_path), str(tmp_path), data=context, unsafe=True, vcs_ref="HEAD")
    assert tmp_path.is_dir()

def test_generation_with_celery(template_path, tmp_path, context):
    """Test template generation with Celery enabled."""
    context["use_celery"] = True
    run_copy(str(template_path), str(tmp_path), data=context, unsafe=True, vcs_ref="HEAD")
    assert (tmp_path / "config" / "celery_app.py").exists()

def test_generation_without_drf(template_path, tmp_path, context):
    """Test template generation without DRF."""
    context["use_drf"] = False
    run_copy(str(template_path), str(tmp_path), data=context, unsafe=True, vcs_ref="HEAD")
    assert not (tmp_path / "config" / "api_router.py").exists()

The template_path and context fixtures are defined in conftest.py.

Matrix testing

We test multiple option combinations to catch interaction bugs. The CI runs tests across:

• Operating systems: Ubuntu, Windows, macOS

• Feature combinations: Default, Celery, async, Heroku

Example parametrized test:

import pytest

@pytest.mark.parametrize("use_celery,use_async,use_heroku", [
    (False, False, False),  # Defaults
    (True, False, False),   # With Celery
    (False, True, False),   # With async
    (False, False, True),   # With Heroku
    (True, True, False),    # Celery + async
])
def test_combinations(template_path, tmp_path, context, use_celery, use_async, use_heroku):
    context.update({
        "use_celery": use_celery,
        "use_async": use_async,
        "use_heroku": use_heroku,
    })
    run_copy(str(template_path), str(tmp_path), data=context, unsafe=True, vcs_ref="HEAD")
    assert tmp_path.is_dir()

Conditional file exclusion testing

Copier uses _exclude patterns in copier.yaml to conditionally exclude files. Tests verify this behavior:

def test_celery_files_excluded_when_disabled(template_path, tmp_path, context):
    """Verify Celery files are excluded when use_celery=False."""
    context["use_celery"] = False
    run_copy(str(template_path), str(tmp_path), data=context, unsafe=True, vcs_ref="HEAD")

    # These files should be excluded by _exclude patterns in copier.yaml
    assert not (tmp_path / "config" / "celery_app.py").exists()
    assert not (tmp_path / "docker" / "local" / "django" / "celery").exists()

def test_post_generation_generates_secrets(template_path, tmp_path, context):
    """Verify post_generation.py generates random secrets in .env."""
    run_copy(str(template_path), str(tmp_path), data=context, unsafe=True, vcs_ref="HEAD")
    env_file = tmp_path / ".env"
    content = env_file.read_text()

    # Secret should be present and not a placeholder
    assert "DJANGO_SECRET_KEY=" in content
    assert "{{" not in content  # No unexpanded template vars

Template updates with Copier

This template uses Copier for template management with built-in update support:

# In a generated project, update to the latest template version
copier update --trust

# Apply a specific template version
copier update --trust --vcs-ref v2.0.0

Copier stores template metadata in .copier-answers.yml, including the template URL and the commit hash used to generate the project.

For maintainers: When making breaking changes, consider using Copier’s migration scripts feature to handle upgrades automatically.