Testimonials

Trying to read the official Django documentation made me realize that it's really a reference guide rather than a manual. The overview is lacking and fails to effectively explain the model. Although the documentation contains a lot of important information it is not written from the perspective of trying to help the reader to understand how to use Django in practice. It appears to cater to the expert software engineers who already understand engineering concepts and how to write code and just want to know the elements of Django's framework and how it differs from other languages.

The other sources of information about Django that are found on the web are from engineer enthusiasts. They espouse their views about Django however many of their blogs and posts are about different versions of Django and Python that are now out of date. Consequently searches for information about how to implement a particular practical application often deliver differing and seemingly contradictory solutions as each enthusiast vehemently proposes their solutions and disses the others. Attempting to follow their examples is confusing and intimidating as the amount of knowledge required to successfully complete a project seems to grow exponentially like Jack's towering beanstalk.

Mastering Django on the other hand is written for humans. The book is readable (and in parts entertaining). The reader is guided through a practical overall perspective, explanations and then on to examples that are useful and easy to follow allowing a novice to quickly get up to speed. It delivers confidence to the reader and shows what is possible with even a moderate amount of effort.

Amazing, I bought this book today and have not been able to put it down !! - Already in my first day I am onto Chapter 7, and have only stopped for a break to write this review !! Chapter 8 is incoming lol 😀

Simplify and Clarify the subject matter! - After 15 Years in IT admin/support and Consultancy I have decided to return to my 1st love...programming !!!! I started out on 8 bit assembly, then 16 Bit assembly then C, COBOL, PASCAL, PROLOG, Delphi and a few others ! - 15 years later and I am back, I have read countless books on HTML4, HTML5, PHP, Python, CSS, JAVA, Javascript which was all worthwhile, but then I read about the DJango framework and it ticked all the boxes for a webapp I have in mind, I found this book unbelievably good, it just explains things in a clear and simple way., much better than any other book I have read.

No nonsense, straight to the point and delivered in a manner that makes it easy to learn. I cannot praise this book enough, many thanks !!! in a word - Concise !

Django Book was vastly superior to other attempts I made at learning Django. The examples walked through help me understand some of the basics that were glossed over in other tutorials while not being overly simplistic.

Djangobook helped me understand the relationship between all of the components and the structures required to build Django apps. It laid the foundation that is letting me build complex apps for myself.

By far the best overview of how Django works that I have found out there! Every other resource I have looked at glosses over the 'why' and jumps right into "lets start an app and then add it to settings.py". The overview here really helped me better understand the overall structure of Django - projects, apps, views, templates, urls, etc.

It's cleaner and more organised - it just gives you what you want. The Mastering Django book is the book to do anything with Django

Your pedagogical writing style it's amazing! I think you are a great teacher and communicator. Despite that English it's not my native language I understood easily all Django concepts that you explained in you book.

Yes, I am a hard core accountant (CPA+CA). My age (46 years) and profession always came in way of learning coding. But I had no option other than learning coding (reason being website www.thakurani.in). So, I was looking for simple, hand holding, affordable django courses. I tried many (yes many). And then I came across Mastering Django Core 1.8 book by Nigel. I read it, but only a little. Then somehow I came across his course "Build your first website with Django 2 (MFDW2.1). I bought it in September mid. I watched all his videos till Module 6. For the first time in my life, I could understand anything other than taxes, accounting and auditing. After watching till Module 6, I had to start revising. I knew that I should by heart till Module 6, then only I should move further in improving navigation, form class, etc. After watching all his videos for more than 5 times (I never felt bored, and he wasn't wrong any where), I started watching from Module 7. I am still watching (for the third time), but I understand coding. I am eagerly waiting for Nigel's next course of Advanced Django. I am very grateful to Nigel for taking out such a wonderful course. And these are not plain words. They originate from my heart.
Thanks Nigel.

Kanishka Mehta.
PS: Nigel, my words may fall short of appreciation, you deserve much more appreciation, respect.
PPS: Did I tell I am 46 years old?

Just finished 'Build a website with Django 2' . I really liked how this book broke-down EVERY line of 'new' code -- this was the first tutorial I was able to get through without getting 'stuck', and I feel like I understand the basics of Django much much better than before. Great work!

Understand the fundamentals of Django/See the bigger picture. Now I feel like I am ready to take on a bigger project.

10/10.

[The book] wasn’t the first my attempt to start learning Django, but it was the first successful one. You are explaining complex things in such a way that they become digestible for beginners.

The reader can follow the creation of a site from the very beginning, step by step. And after all get a simple, but working resource, deployed in the web.

All information is good structured, given in digestible portions, and the author avoids digging in concepts that too complex for beginners. Every page says to the reader: Keep calm and follow how stuff is getting done.

My conclusion? “Build your first website with Python and Django” is the best point to start learning Django from.

I'm finding it to be useful not only from a "cookbook" standpoint, but also very well written with clear technical explanations suitable for beginners.

In nutshell I could only say, I was missing this page for a long time and had expected that someone should work to make Django simpler for beginners and there you go. whatever information is mentioned on this site is very good, be it challenges of beginners or knowledge of Django all have been phrased accurately. this piece of work is a great effort to introduce Django to beginners community by making it simple and to the point.

I was not able to understand the structure of django project before reading this site, even after going through many boring tutorials online which can only make you sleep.

As a numbers guy, I am trying to step out of using simple tools like Excel and PowerPoint for communicating my findings. Some analyses are far more appropriately distributable via the web. Enter Django. My goal for analysis communication is to come up with a home built solution that is portable, cost effective and scalable. After some initial review, I settled on Django as the platform of choice. I've been through half a dozen books and walkthrough but still left feeling like I couldn't sufficiently build a solution on my own, let alone a robust solution.

After taking Nige's course, I feel far more confident about the process of building a Django website than I have with all the books combined. Actually listening to an explanation instead of reading one and assuming you're on the right track definitely gave me the added confidence to build a site that does the job I'm looking to accomplish. It's still a lofty goal but I feel far more comfortable with Django.

There are many django books out there, but none explain the concepts like you do.
You made me understand something I have been struggling over for almost 6 months now, I just understood it in just about 10 mins of reading your book.

I really liked how you imagined this site, I was searching for something like Django’s Structure – A Heretic’s Eye View and it was right thing that I wanted to see, also the rest of the page is great, I will definitely invest some time to dive in the content

MY biggest struggle as a senior programmer coming from java land is trying to equate my previous experience with this framework. I loved your explanation of the framework for those of us that come from other multiple framework Xs out there.

Unreal, absolutely the best Django tutorial I've come across. Actually, it's probably the best online tutorial I've come across for any programming topic. Nige explains every detail perfectly.

Helped me experience my AHA! moment. I've gone through a few tutorials and they just didn't click like the Django 2 course. I was hooked, the first day I went through 6 or 7 modules and I can't put it down. Having the transcripts is great, even though it's all in the book I print out the transcripts before each module and add notes.

I am about 60 percent done with this course and I am loving it. I’m new to Django and Python and decided to learn both at the same time, due to the fact that I want to build a database website for my “learning project”. This course fits my needs perfectly. Nigel explains every line of code, he allows you to pause the video to catch up, the flow just seems right. It was worth my money. Not only do you get the video instructions, you also get a nicely formatted pdf transcript of each section and finished source, alongside the pdf and ebook version of the course. I can’t wait to finish it and look forward to more advanced courses!

Hello, I've just read a chapter on templates and I have to say it's great. I'm a backend developer who didn't have to work with templates before, so I didn't really touch this topic. But today I had to, and with your tutorial it was a really nice experience. Keep up the good work 😉

I picked up Python a few months ago and had to deploy one of my projects as a webapp. I can't even begin to tell you how useful your Django tutorials have been for me. I consulted many other Django resources but none matched the sophistication yet simplicity of the content.