Force django-admin startproject if project folder already exists

Question

I want to start new django project in already existing folder and obviously get

CommandError: '/home/user/projectfolder' already exists.

Is there some way to force startproject command to create project in an existing folder? I have some important data in that folder and also git folder so I don't want to move it somewhere and then move it back.

score 156 · Accepted Answer · edited Sep 20 '22 at 18:35

156

Just use the current directory:

cd /home/user/projectfolder

django-admin.py startproject project .

The use of . just instructs Django to create a project in the current directory while:

django-admin.py startproject

instructs Django to create a project and create the necessary directory

If only the project name is given, both the project directory and project package will be named and the project directory will be created in the current working directory.

This fails because of the existing directory which is not a bug but a constrain in order to prevent accidents.

edited Sep 20 '22 at 18:35

desertnaut

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answered Jul 15 '15 at 13:41

petkostas

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lol I thought 'project' is my project's name, while you literally mean 'project' – Stamatis Deliyannis Jul 16 '22 at 17:07

score 15 · Answer 2 · answered Apr 02 '17 at 19:46

15

You can make too like this:

 django-admin startproject name_project path_project

Example:

 django-admin startproject example /tmp/example

answered Apr 02 '17 at 19:46

Elinaldo Monteiro

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Force django-admin startproject if project folder already exists

2 Answers2