ColdFront Initializer Plugin

ColdFront initializer is a plugin for ColdFront version 2 that loads data from YAML files into the ColdFront database.

Features

• Load data new into ColdFront 2.x.
• Migrate data from a ColdFront 1.1.x instance to a ColdFront 2.x instance.
• Load test data into a development instance.
• Import community supported data libraries into ColdFront: fields of science, permissions, roles.

Install

Install ColdFront and add initializer extra group:

$ uv tool install coldfront[initializer]

If you already have ColdFront installed you can run:

$ uv sync --extra initializer

Or install directly via pip:

$ uv pip install coldfront-initializer

Next add the plugin to the PLUGINS setting in your ColdFront configuration:

PLUGINS="coldfront_initializer"

Load Data

Load the Test Data

WARNING: Do not use the test data in production.

Run this command to load the test data:

$ uv run coldfront load_test_data

Copy the Example Files

Run this command to copy the example files to a directory:

$ uv run coldfront copy_initializer_examples --path /path/for/example/files

You can edit the copied files. Then load the edited files with the command load_initializer_data.

Load Data From a Directory

Run this command to load the YAML files from a directory:

$ uv run coldfront load_initializer_data --path /path/to/yaml/files

Example YAML Files

Each YAML file has the name of the initializer. For example, to load users into ColdFront you create a file named users.yml. The YAML file format uses either a list or a dict format. This example shows the dict format in users.yml where the key of each record is the user name:

# users.yml
admin:
  is_active: true
  is_superuser: true
  password_hash: pbkdf2_sha256$1000000$...

cgray:
  first_name: C.
  last_name: Gray
  is_active: true
  is_superuser: false

This example shows the list format in projects.yml:

# projects.yml
- name: Angular momentum in QGP holography
  slug: p1000001
  owner: cgray
  tenant: Computer Science
  users:
    - cgray
    - astewart
  tags:
    - Faculty
  custom_field_data:
    allocation_code: 1001

Foreign key references use string names. The plugin resolves the names. For example, owner: cgray refers to the user cgray. Tags are under tags. Custom fields are under custom_field_data.

Community Library

The ColdFront community maintains a library of common initial data. You can load this data into your ColdFront instance.

Run this command to load the custom_fields library:

$ uv run coldfront load_initializer_data --library custom_fields

Run this command to list the available libraries and their YAML files:

$ uv run coldfront load_initializer_data --list-libraries

The command shows the library name and the YAML files in the library.

Credits

This plugin was adopted from https://github.com/tobiasge/netbox-initializers written by Tobias Genannt.

License

Apache 2.0