Saving to two models via intermediate form - Django

Question

Alright guys, I am stuck.

The problem I have is as follows: I have two Models, RelenvaceCodingRecord and EventRecord.
The user should be able to select if an article is relevant. If it is, other fields of the form should be required, if it is not = no required fields. This has to happen in one form, on the same page, without JS.

What I did so far is to create a form (forms.Form) that has many of the fields of the two models. Following this article, I tried to implement the conditional required logic:

class CodingForm(forms.Form):
    relevance = forms.BooleanField(required=False)
    event_date = forms.DateField('Event Date',required=False)
    location = forms.ModelChoiceField(queryset=Location.objects.all(), empty_label=None, required=False)
    actors = forms.CharField(max_length=100, required=False)
    party = forms.NullBooleanField('Party')
    labor_org = forms.NullBooleanField('Labor Organization')
    property_dmg = forms.NullBooleanField('Property Damage')
    violence = forms.NullBooleanField('Violence')
    injured = forms.IntegerField(required=False)
    deaths = forms.IntegerField(required=False)
    participants_num = forms.IntegerField(required=False)
    participants_str = forms.IntegerField(required=False)
    anti_gov = forms.NullBooleanField('Anti Government')
    presence = forms.NullBooleanField('Presence')
    intervene = forms.NullBooleanField('Intervention')
    brutality = forms.NullBooleanField('Brutality')
    arrests = forms.NullBooleanField('Arrests')
    issue = forms.CharField(max_length=100,required=False)
    url = forms.CharField(max_length=100,required=False)

    def __init__(self, data=None, *args, **kwargs):
        super(CodingForm, self).__init__(data, *args, **kwargs)

        if data and data.get('relevance', None) == True:
            self.fields['event_date'].required = True
            self.fields['location'].required = True
            self.fields['anti_gov'].required = True

In my view, then, I tried to get the form and pass its values to two ModelForms of the RelevanceCodingRecord and the EventRecord and save it all:

if request.method == 'POST':
    if 'coding' in request.POST:
    event_form = EventRecordForm(request.POST, prefix='event')
    relevance_form = RelevanceCodingRecordForm(request.POST, prefix='event')
    coding_form = CodingForm(request.POST, prefix='coding')

    if coding_form.is_valid():
        obj = coding_form.save(commit=False)
        event = event_form.save(commit=False)
        relevance = relevance_form.save(commit=False)

        # Relevance Data
        relevance.relevance = obj.relevance
        relevance.screened = True
        relevance.classified = True
        relevance.coder = request.user.coder
        relevance.article = paginator.page(page).object_list[0]
        relevance.last_updated = datetime.datetime.today
        relevance.save()

        if relenvace.relevance == True:
        # Event Data
            event.article = paginator.page(page).object_list[0]
            event.event_date = obj.event_date
            event.country = paginator.page(page).object_list[0].country
            event.location = obj.event_location
            event.actors = obj.actors
            event.party = obj.party
            event.labor_org = obj.labor_org
            event.property_dmg = obj.property_dmg
            event.violence = obj.violence
            event.injured = obj.injured
            event.deaths = obj.deaths
            event.participants_num = obj.participants_num
            event.participants_str = obj.participants_str
            event.anti_gov = obj.anti_gov
            event.presence = obj.presence
            event.intervene = obj.intervene
            event.brutality = obj.brutality
            event.arrests = obj.arrests
            event.issue = obj.issue
            event.url = paginator.page(page).object_list[0].source
            event.coder = request.user.coder
            event.last_updated = datetime.datetime.today
            event.save()

            redirect_to = "?page=%s" % page
            return HttpResponseRedirect(redirect_to)
        else:
            redirect_to = "?page=%s" % page
            return HttpResponseRedirect(redirect_to)

else:
    coding_form = CodingForm(prefix='coding')
    coding_form.fields["location"].queryset = Location.objects.filter(ccode=country).order_by('name')

This, however, does not work: No Records are created in my database, I only get redirected.
Is there a way to make this work, at all? Or am I on a fools errand here?
Most of the data passing from one form to the other is not DRY as well, but I don't know a better way.

Any help here is greatly appreciated!

Answer 1

Since coding_form is not an instance of ModelForm and hence coding_form.save() will not work and will not return a model instance. You can access form data by using coding_form.cleaned_data dictionary.