How to upload a file with Django

Question

I'm trying to write form to upload a file with Django. The admin form works just fine, but the problem is that after I click submit on my form, the form loses the file that I selected (filename disappears and 'No file chosen' appears next to 'Choose File' button), and the view won't validate the form because the file is missing. My form/view/file handler look just like the django example.

forms.py

class AttachForm(forms.ModelForm):
    class Meta:
            model = Attachment
            exclude = ('insp', 'contributor', 'date')

views.py

def handle_uploaded_file(f):
    destination = open('some/file/name.txt', 'wb+')
    for chunk in f.chunks():
        destination.write(chunk)
    destination.close()

def attach(request, insp_id):
    if request.method == 'POST':
            form = AttachForm(request.POST, request.FILES)
            if form.is_valid():
                    handle_uploaded_file(request.FILES['file'])
                    f = form.save(commit=False)
                    f.contributor = request.user
                    f.insp = insp_id
                    f.save()
                    return HttpResponseRedirect(server + '/inspections/' + str(insp_id) + '/')
    else:
            form = AttachForm()
    return render_to_response('attach.html', locals(), context_instance=RequestContext(request))

models.py

class Attachment(models.Model):
    insp = models.ForeignKey(Inspection)
    contributor = models.ForeignKey(User, related_name='+')
    date = models.DateTimeField()
    title = models.CharField(max_length=50)
    attachment = models.FileField(upload_to='attachments')
    def __unicode__(self):
        return self.title
    def save(self):
        if self.date == None:
            self.date = datetime.now()
        super(Attachment, self).save()
    class Meta:
        ordering = ['-date']

attach.html

{% extends "base.html" %}

{% block title %}Add Attachment{% endblock %}

{% block content %}
<h2>Attach File: Inspection {{ insp_id }}</h2>
<p>This form is used to attach a file to an inspection.</p>
<form action="." method="POST" autocomplete="off">{% csrf_token %}
    <table cellspacing="10" cellpadding="1">
        {% for field in form %}
            <tr>
            <th align="left">               
                {{ field.label_tag }}:
            </th>
            <td>
                {{ field }}
            </td>
            <td>
                {{ field.errors|striptags }}
            </td>
        </tr>
        {% endfor %}
        <tr><td></td><td><input type="submit" value="Submit"></td></tr>
    </table>
</form>
{% endblock %}

Any ideas of what I could be doing wrong?

Answer 1

Change this...

handle_uploaded_file(request.FILES['file'])

To this...

handle_uploaded_file(request.FILES['attachment'])

The file is stored in the POST data with the name of your field.