import os from dotenv import load_dotenv # Explicitly load the specific .local file # You can also load the standard .env first, then override with .local load_dotenv(".env") load_dotenv(".env.python.local", override=True) db_url = os.getenv("DATABASE_URL") print(f"Connecting to: db_url") Use code with caution. Copied to clipboard Best Practices
| Problem | Solution | |---------|----------| | Variables not loading | Check file path – use os.path.abspath('.env.python.local') | | Spaces causing errors | Use quotes: KEY="value with spaces" | | Boolean parsing fails | Compare with string: os.getenv('DEBUG') == 'True' | | Override not working | Add override=True in load_dotenv() | | SQLAlchemy URL errors | Use postgresql:// not postgres:// (Django fix) | .env.python.local
# AWS Credentials AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=your-access-key-id AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=your-secret-access-key AWS_STORAGE_BUCKET_NAME=your-bucket-name AWS_S3_REGION_NAME=us-east-1 import os from dotenv import load_dotenv # Explicitly
In this example, the .env.python.local file stores environment variables for the database and API key. The settings.py file loads the environment variables using the dotenv package and uses them to configure the application. .env.python.local