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django-nullable-model-string-field (DJ001)

Added in v0.0.246 · Related issues · View source

Derived from the flake8-django linter.

What it does

Checks nullable string-based fields (like CharField and TextField) in Django models.

Why is this bad?

If a string-based field is nullable, then your model will have two possible representations for "no data": None and the empty string. This can lead to confusion, as clients of the API have to check for both None and the empty string when trying to determine if the field has data.

The Django convention is to use the empty string in lieu of None for string-based fields.

Example

from django.db import models


class MyModel(models.Model):
    field = models.CharField(max_length=255, null=True)

Use instead:

from django.db import models


class MyModel(models.Model):
    field = models.CharField(max_length=255, default="")