How to set initial values for a ModelForm when instance is also given

Question

It seems like if a ModelForm is given an instance, it ignores any values you provide for initial and instead sets it to the value of the instance -- even if tha

Answer 1

Sounds to me that you may be looking for a bound form. Not entirely sure, I'm trying to unpick a similar issue:

Django forms can be instantiated with two arguments which control this kind of thing. As I understand it:

form = MyForm(initial={...}, data={...}, ...)

initial will set the possible values for the fields—like setting a queryset—data will set the actual (or selected) values of a form and create a bound form. Maybe that is what you want. Another, tangental, point you might find interesting is to consider a factory method rather than a constructor, I think the syntax is more natural:

class MyForm(forms.ModelForm):

    ...

    @staticmethod
    def makeBoundForm(user):
        myObjSet = MyObject.objects.filter(some_attr__user=user)
        if len(myObjSet) is not 0:
            data = {'myObject': myObjSet[0]}
        else:
            raise ValueError()
        initial = {'myObject': myObjSet}
        return MyForm(initial=initial, data=data)