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+================================
+Django 1.1 alpha 1 release notes
+================================
+
+February 23, 2009
+
+Welcome to Django 1.1 alpha 1!
+
+This is the first in a series of preview/development releases leading up to the
+eventual release of Django 1.1, currently scheduled to take place in April 2009.
+This release is primarily targeted at developers who are interested in trying
+out new features and testing the Django codebase to help identify and resolve
+bugs prior to the final 1.1 release.
+
+As such, this release is *not* intended for production use, and any such use is
+discouraged.
+
+What's new in Django 1.1 alpha 1
+================================
+
+ORM improvements
+----------------
+
+Two major enhancements have been added to Django's object-relational mapper
+(ORM):
+
+Aggregate support
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+.. currentmodule:: django.db.models
+
+It's now possible to run SQL aggregate queries (i.e. ``COUNT()``, ``MAX()``,
+``MIN()``, etc.) from within Django's ORM. You can choose to either return the
+results of the aggregate directly, or else annotate the objects in a
+:class:`QuerySet` with the results of the aggregate query.
+
+This feature is available as new :meth:`QuerySet.aggregate()`` and
+:meth:`QuerySet.annotate()`` methods, and is covered in detail in :doc:`the ORM
+aggregation documentation </topics/db/aggregation>`
+
+Query expressions
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+Queries can now refer to a another field on the query and can traverse
+relationships to refer to fields on related models. This is implemented in the
+new :class:`F` object; for full details, including examples, consult the
+:ref:`documentation for F expressions <query-expressions>`.
+
+Performance improvements
+------------------------
+
+.. currentmodule:: django.test
+
+Tests written using Django's :doc:`testing framework </topics/testing>` now run
+dramatically faster (as much as 10 times faster in many cases).
+
+This was accomplished through the introduction of transaction-based tests: when
+using :class:`django.test.TestCase`, your tests will now be run in a transaction
+which is rolled back when finished, instead of by flushing and re-populating the
+database. This results in an immense speedup for most types of unit tests. See
+the documentation for :class:`TestCase` and :class:`TransactionTestCase` for a
+full description, and some important notes on database support.
+
+Other improvements
+------------------
+
+Other new features and changes introduced since Django 1.0 include:
+
+* The :doc:`CSRF protection middleware </ref/contrib/csrf>` has been split into
+ two classes -- ``CsrfViewMiddleware`` checks incoming requests, and
+ ``CsrfResponseMiddleware`` processes outgoing responses. The combined
+ ``CsrfMiddleware`` class (which does both) remains for
+ backwards-compatibility, but using the split classes is now recommended in
+ order to allow fine-grained control of when and where the CSRF processing
+ takes place.
+
+* :func:`~django.core.urlresolvers.reverse` and code which uses it (e.g., the
+ ``{% url %}`` template tag) now works with URLs in Django's administrative
+ site, provided that the admin URLs are set up via ``include(admin.site.urls)``
+ (sending admin requests to the ``admin.site.root`` view still works, but URLs
+ in the admin will not be "reversible" when configured this way).
+
+* The ``include()`` function in Django URLconf modules can now accept sequences
+ of URL patterns (generated by ``patterns()``) in addition to module names.
+
+* Instances of Django forms (see :doc:`the forms overview </topics/forms/index>`)
+ now have two additional methods, ``hidden_fields()`` and ``visible_fields()``,
+ which return the list of hidden -- i.e., ``<input type="hidden">`` -- and
+ visible fields on the form, respectively.
+
+* The ``redirect_to`` generic view (see :doc:`the generic views documentation
+ </ref/generic-views>`) now accepts an additional keyword argument
+ ``permanent``. If ``permanent`` is ``True``, the view will emit an HTTP
+ permanent redirect (status code 301). If ``False``, the view will emit an HTTP
+ temporary redirect (status code 302).
+
+* A new database lookup type -- ``week_day`` -- has been added for ``DateField``
+ and ``DateTimeField``. This type of lookup accepts a number between 1 (Sunday)
+ and 7 (Saturday), and returns objects where the field value matches that day
+ of the week. See :ref:`the full list of lookup types <field-lookups>` for
+ details.
+
+* The ``{% for %}`` tag in Django's template language now accepts an optional
+ ``{% empty %}`` clause, to be displayed when ``{% for %}`` is asked to loop
+ over an empty sequence. See :doc:`the list of built-in template tags
+ </ref/templates/builtins>` for examples of this.
+
+The Django 1.1 roadmap
+======================
+
+Before Django 1.1 goes final, several other preview/development releases will be
+made available. The current schedule consists of at least the following:
+
+* Week of *March 20, 2009:* Django 1.1 beta 1, at which point Django 1.1 will
+ be in "feature freeze": no new features will be implemented for 1.1
+ past that point, and all new feature work will be deferred to
+ Django 1.2.
+
+* Week of *April 2, 2009:* Django 1.1 release candidate. At this point all
+ strings marked for translation must freeze to allow translations to
+ be submitted in advance of the final release.
+
+* Week of *April 13, 2009:* Django 1.1 final.
+
+If deemed necessary, additional alpha, beta or release candidate packages will
+be issued prior to the final 1.1 release.
+
+What you can do to help
+=======================
+
+In order to provide a high-quality 1.1 release, we need your help. Although this
+alpha release is, again, *not* intended for production use, you can help the
+Django team by trying out the alpha codebase in a safe test environment and
+reporting any bugs or issues you encounter. The Django ticket tracker is the
+central place to search for open issues:
+
+ * http://code.djangoproject.com/timeline
+
+Please open new tickets if no existing ticket corresponds to a problem you're
+running into.
+
+Additionally, discussion of Django development, including progress toward the
+1.1 release, takes place daily on the django-developers mailing list:
+
+ * http://groups.google.com/group/django-developers
+
+... and in the ``#django-dev`` IRC channel on ``irc.freenode.net``. If you're
+interested in helping out with Django's development, feel free to join the
+discussions there.
+
+Django's online documentation also includes pointers on how to contribute to
+Django:
+
+ * :doc:`How to contribute to Django </internals/contributing>`
+
+Contributions on any level -- developing code, writing documentation or simply
+triaging tickets and helping to test proposed bugfixes -- are always welcome and
+appreciated.
+
+Development sprints for Django 1.1 will also be taking place at PyCon US 2009,
+on the dedicated sprint days (March 30 through April 2), and anyone who wants to
+help out is welcome to join in, either in person at PyCon or virtually in the
+IRC channel or on the mailing list.