how to run Django locally as a windows executable app

Question

I'm considering building app with Django for only one user that would run application locally on windows. I read about containerizing Django apps, but it's new for me. My goal is to run Django server on one click like a standard windows app and connect to it on localhost and interact with web browser. It is even possible?

Answer 1

It is possible, but this may not be the best solution. If you want to release a Django app that can be installed on your client computer, you usually need to ensure all the dependencies are shipped with the app.

Containerising your application means it will depends on Docker runtime (or any container system you use). You will have to setup Docker with your app, or ensure your client has Docker on his machine to run it. If the destination machine runs Windows or macOS, you will need to setup docker-desktop which may be more complicated than standard Docker runtime (linux only).

But if you decide to ship your app without containerising it, it will only depends on a Python interpreter and some dependencies (Django, dateutil, etc.). In such case, using python tools like virtualenv, you may prepare a ready-to-run application by creating the venv and installing dependencies at "build time". Then, with a proper setup (MSI for Windows or DMG for macOS), you may be able to distribute the final application so the client can install and run it without any additional step (you do all the hard job yourself).

Answer 2

Django app can be convert into.exe but it wont work as local server while click.exe because runserver command and some of django service wont support on this way as per my experiment.