Django is doing something weird with my DATABASES settings

Question

I want to switch db backends from django_pyodbc to sqlite in order to make sure my custom user model works before I start messing around with my db. So I commented out the DATABASES setting and put in a new one which uses sqlite. I've done this before (on this project as well) with no problems, but now I have no idea what's going on.

syncdb responds as if it is looking at a db that has already been synced, i.e. it does nothing.

In shell, settings.DATABASES returns the settings for my original db (shockingly, it still thinks I'm using the sqlserver_ado backend which I switched out for django_pyodbc a couple of weeks ago), and I can access models which don't have any relation to my user model, but those that do return an error (because I changed some user field names). In the traceback I see that it is still looking at the MSSQL db.

runserver works, but when I go to a page I get a DatabaseError - no such table: django_session. The exception location is in ...\django\db\backends\sqlite3\...

Here is the full traceback:

Traceback:
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\core\handlers\base.py" in get_response
  187.                 response = middleware_method(request, response)
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\contrib\sessions\middleware.py" in process_response
  28.                 if request.session.get_expire_at_browser_close():
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\contrib\sessions\backends\base.py" in get_expire_at_browser_close
  253.         if self.get('_session_expiry') is None:
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\contrib\sessions\backends\base.py" in get
  57.         return self._session.get(key, default)
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\contrib\sessions\backends\base.py" in _get_session
  168.                 self._session_cache = self.load()
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\contrib\sessions\backends\db.py" in load
  18.                 expire_date__gt=timezone.now()
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\db\models\manager.py" in get
  143.         return self.get_query_set().get(*args, **kwargs)
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\db\models\query.py" in get
  398.         num = len(clone)
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\db\models\query.py" in __len__
  106.                 self._result_cache = list(self.iterator())
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\db\models\query.py" in iterator
  317.         for row in compiler.results_iter():
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\db\models\sql\compiler.py" in results_iter
  775.         for rows in self.execute_sql(MULTI):
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\db\models\sql\compiler.py" in execute_sql
  840.         cursor.execute(sql, params)
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\db\backends\util.py" in execute
  41.             return self.cursor.execute(sql, params)
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\db\backends\sqlite3\base.py" in execute
  366.             six.reraise(utils.DatabaseError, utils.DatabaseError(*tuple(e.args)), sys.exc_info()[2])
File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\db\backends\sqlite3\base.py" in execute
  362.             return Database.Cursor.execute(self, query, params)

And yes; I have tried turning my computer on and off again. Any ideas? Thank you.

== EDIT ==

Here are my DATABASES settings:

DATABASES = {
    'default': {
        'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.sqlite3',
        'NAME': PROJECT_ROOT.child('temp_db').child('sqlite.db'),
        'USER': '',
        'PASSWORD': '',
        'HOST': '',
        'PORT': '',
    }
}

# DATABASES = {
#     'default': {
#         'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.django_pyodbc',
#         'NAME': my_project,
#         'USER': '',
#         'PASSWORD': '',
#         'HOST': my_host,
#         'PORT': '',
#         'OPTIONS': {
#             'driver': 'SQL Server',
#             'MARS_Connection': True,
#         }
#     }
# }

== EDIT2 ==

I looked in my settings folder to find __init__.py, base.py, dev.py and their associated .pyc files. In addition, there is a settings.pyc file with no corresponding .py file (I'm assuming this is a remnant from before I chopped up settings.py into seperate pieces. I tried deleting it and doing syncdb again and got this:

C:\...\my_project>manage.py syncdb --settings=my_project.settings.devettings=web_ems.
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\...\my_project\manage.py", line 15, in <module>
    if settings.DEBUG:
  File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\conf\__init__.py", line 53, in __getattr__
    self._setup(name)
  File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\conf\__init__.py", line 48, in _setup
    self._wrapped = Settings(settings_module)
  File "C:\Python27\lib\site-packages\django\conf\__init__.py", line 134, in __init__
    raise ImportError("Could not import settings '%s' (Is it on sys.path?): %s"% (self.SETTINGS_MODULE, e))

ImportError: Could not import settings 'my_project.settings.settings' (Is it on sys
.path?): No module named settings

Answer 1

You are not using the right settings module, therefore the changes you make will not have any effect.

The possible causes can be many, however the main possibilities are two:

1. You are using a module from the wrong location (i.e. your PYTHONPATH is wrong);
2. Your DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE is wrong.

Bonus tip: if you want to know what settings module you are using, open the shell and type:

>>> from django.conf import settings
>>> settings.SETTINGS_MODULE
'my_project.settings'

Then, if you want to know whether you are using my_project.settings from the right path, use:

>>> from my_project import settings
>>> settings
<module 'my_project.settings' from '...'>