API¶

We are migrating documentation of the core Lino modules from docstrings (in lino.core) to prosa format (in this section).

The lino.api package contains a series of modules that encapsulate Lino’s core functionalities. They don’t define anything on their own but just import things that are commonly used in different contexts. One module for each of the three startup phases used when writing application code:

The lino.api.ad module (application design) contains classes and functions that are available already before your Lino application gets initialized. You use it to define your overall application structure (in your settings.py files and in the __init__.py files of your plugins).
The lino.api.dd module (database design) is for when you are describing your database schema in your models.py modules.
The lino.api.rt module (runtime) contains functions and classes that are commonly used “at runtime”, i.e. when the Lino application has been initialized. You may import it at the global namespace of a models.py file, but you can use most of it only when the startup() function has been called.

Recommended usage is to import these modules as follows:

from lino.api import ad, dd, rt, _

The lino.api.core is a pseudo module used to simplify things for application developers.

The Lino core API

The remaining part of this document has been automatically generated from the source code.

The `lino` package ¶

The lino package is the main plugin used by all Lino applications, and the root for the subpackages that define core functionalites.

As a plugin it is added automatically to your INSTALLED_APPS. It defines no models, some template files, a series of django-admin commands, the core translation messages and the core help_texts.py file.

`core`	Contains Lino's core functionalities.
`hello`	If you want to see which version of Lino you have, you can say "hello" to Lino:
`api`	Documentation is being migrated to prosa style in API.
`utils`	`lino.utils` (the top-level module) contains a few often-used function for general use.
`mixins`	This package contains model mixins, some of which are heavily used by applications and the Lino Extensions Library.
`projects`	Most of this package has been moved to lino_book.
`modlib`	The standard model library included with Lino.
`sphinxcontrib`	Some extensions for Sphinx.
`management.commands`	See The django-admin commands added by the lino plugin.

lino.startup(settings_module=None)¶

Start up Django and Lino.

TODO: move this to doctest (and adapt all tested docs).

Optional settings_module is the name of a Django settings module. If this is specified, set the DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE environment variable.

This is called automatically when a process is invoked by a django-admin command.

This is usually called in the initialization code snippet of a tested document.

If your doctest reports a failure of the following type:

Failed example:
    startup('lino_amici.projects.amici1.settings')
Expected nothing
Got:
    Started /usr/lib/python3.10/doctest.py ... docs/specs/overview.rst (using lino_amici.projects.amici1.settings.demo) --> PID 217238

then it’s because your project directory contains a log directory.

class lino.AppConfig(app_name, app_module)¶

Bases: AppConfig

This is the only django.apps.AppConfig object used by Lino. Lino applications instead use the lino.core.plugins.Plugin class to define plugins. See More about plugins.

The `lino_xl` package ¶

This package contains the code of the Lino Extensions Library.

See Plugins API for the list of plugins.

lib

These are the plugins included with Lino XL.

The `lino_react` package ¶

react

A user interface for Lino applications that uses FaceBooks React JS framework.

The `lino_book` package ¶

This is the code repository that contains (1) the Sphinx source files of the Lino Developer Guide, (2) the lino_book Python package and (3) a test suite with doctest-based tests for the Lino framework.

The Lino Developer Guide is the technical documentation tree of the Lino framework. It is visible on https://dev.lino-framework.org.

The lino_book Python package is a collection of small example Lino applications used for educational and testing purposes.

The code repositories for the lino and lino_xl Python packages have no documentation tree on their own and almost no unit tests, they are tested and documented here.

Code repository: https://gitlab.com/lino-framework/book
Test results: https://gitlab.com/lino-framework/book/-/pipelines
Feedback: https://community.lino-framework.org
Maintainer: https://www.saffre-rumma.net/

The lino_book package contains a set of example projects used both for testing and explaining Lino framework.

It is not published on PyPI because that would make no sense. You use it by cloning the repository from GitLab (which is done automatically by getlino configure with –devtools).

projects

This package contains example applications included with the Lino book.

Lino applications covered by the book ¶

The following Lino applications have their developer specs and API in the Lino book and form an integral part of the Lino core because they also serve for testing purposes.