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Using SQLite with Django

If you want to use SQLite as a database for your Django project deployed on Appliku, you need to do three things:

  1. Create a volume in your application settings
  2. Ensure your settings file respects DATABASE_URL for populating the DATABASES object
  3. Set the environment variable DATABASE_URL that points to a file within the volume

Why a Volume is Needed​

Apps in Appliku run in containers with an ephemeral filesystem — data is not persisted between container restarts and deploys.

To prevent data loss going unnoticed, Appliku's built-in Docker images prevent writing to the code folder. A persistent volume solves this by providing a directory that survives deployments.

Create a Volume for the SQLite Database File​

Go to your application settings, switch to the Volumes tab.

Click "+Add" and in the form only specify the "Container path" — set it to /db/.

Creating a volume for SQLite

Set the DATABASE_URL Environment Variable​

Go to the "Environment Variables" tab and add a variable DATABASE_URL with the value:

sqlite:////db/db.sqlite3

(Yes, four slashes!)

DATABASE_URL environment variable

Hit the "Save and deploy" button, wait for your deployment to finish.

Now your project is using SQLite database with persistent storage.