lighttpd configuration for running django and legacy website together

Question

I'm planning to migrate an old website to django. Initially, I want to use django for the urls www.mydomain.com/news, and continue to use the old static website for everything else.

I have little experience of lighttpd, which my django host uses, so I need some help with the configuration.

For a default django install, the lighttpd configuration is:

# mydomain
$HTTP["host"] =~ "(^|\.)mydomain.com$" {
    fastcgi.server = (
        "/django.fcgi" => (
            "main" => (
                "socket" => env.HOME + "/projectname/projectname.sock",
                "check-local" => "disable",
            )
        ),
    )
    alias.url = (
        "/media" => env.HOME + "/projectname/media",
    )

    url.rewrite-once = (
        "^(/media.*)$" => "$1",
        "^(/.*)$" => "/django.fcgi$1",
    )
}

I've changed the line

"^(/.*)$" => "/django.fcgi$1",

to

"^(/news/.*)$" => "/django.fcgi$1",

so that django is only used for urls beginning /news/, but I don't know how to redirect everything else to the static website folder.

Answer 1

server.document-root = env.HOME + "/projectname/static" should do the trick. On a side note: Your rewrite pattern:

 "^(/news/.*)$" => "/django.fcgi$1",

should probably been written as:

"^/news/(.*)$" => "/django.fcgi$1",

That way the "/news/" part of the url doesn't get passed on to the django.