Django 1.11 TypeError context must be a dict rather than Context

Question

Just received the Sentry error TypeError context must be a dict rather than Context. on one of my forms. I know it has something to do with Django 1.11, but I

Answer 1

Migrated from Django 1.8 to Django 1.11.6

Wherever i had a RequestContext class, there is a method flatten() wich return the result as a dict.

So if the class is RequestContext....

return t.render(context)

becomes

return t.render(context.flatten())

And in a case wich the context is is wrapped by Context(), just remove it. Because Context() is deprecated.

return t.render(Context(ctx))

becomes

return t.render(ctx)

Answer 2

For django 1.11 and after, context must be dict.

You can use:

context_dict = get_context_dict(context)
return t.render(context_dict)

or

context_dict = context.flatten()
return t.render(context_dict)

Answer 3

In Django 1.8+, the template's render method takes a dictionary for the context parameter. Support for passing a Context instance is deprecated, and gives an error in Django 1.10+.

In your case, just use a regular dict instead of a Context instance:

message = get_template('email_forms/direct_donation_form_email.html').render(ctx)

You may prefer to use the render_to_string shortcut:

from django.template.loader import render_to_string

message = render_to_string('email_forms/direct_donation_form_email.html', ctx)

If you were using RequestContext instead of Context, then you would pass the request to these methods as well so that the context processors run.

message = get_template('email_forms/direct_donation_form_email.html').render(ctx, request=request)
message = render_to_string('email_forms/direct_donation_form_email.html', ctx, request=request)