Django App Help

Filesystem-backed Markdown help for Django applications. Help content lives in your Git repository, deploys read-only with the app, and renders in the browser through django-wildewidgets.

Use it for in-app guidance, workflow documentation, field explanations, and operational notes — not as a full CMS.

Features

• Canonical Markdown pages under help/pages/
• Audience-specific books defined in YAML under help/books/
• Reusable snippets via ::include directives
• Cross-page links with help: URLs and asset references with asset: URLs
• HelpEngine for loading, rendering, and validating content
• HelpOffcanvasMixin to attach a help panel to Wildewidgets views

Installation

Install the package and its runtime dependencies:

pip install django-app-help

Or:

uv add django-app-help

Or, from a checkout of this repository:

uv sync

Dependencies include Django, PyYAML, django-markdownify, and django-wildewidgets.

Help content layout

Point Django at a help root directory with this structure:

help/
├── books/
│   ├── user.yaml
│   └── admin.yaml
├── pages/
│   ├── getting-started/
│   │   └── welcome.md
│   └── topics/
│       └── pages.md
├── snippets/
│   └── support-contact.md
└── assets/
    └── images/

• Page IDs are paths under pages/ without .md (for example getting-started/welcome).

• Books list page IDs in sections for different audiences. The same page can appear in multiple books.

• Snippets are included in pages with a whole-line directive:

  ::include snippets/support-contact.md

• Links reference other pages and assets:

  [Navigation](help:getting-started/navigation)
  ![Diagram](asset:images/help-diagram.png)

Pages may include YAML front matter (title, summary, audience, and so on). The engine strips front matter before rendering.

Django setup

Settings

Add the app (optional — there are no database models, but this keeps the integration explicit):

INSTALLED_APPS = [
    # ...
    "markdownify",
    "wildewidgets",
    "app_help",
]

Set the filesystem help root and import the recommended Markdownify settings:

from pathlib import Path

from app_help.conf import MARKDOWNIFY  # noqa: F401

APP_HELP_ROOT = Path(__file__).resolve().parent / "myapp" / "help"

app_help.conf.MARKDOWNIFY whitelists the HTML tags help pages need when rendered through django-markdownify.

Wildewidgets views

Use HelpOffcanvasMixin on a Wildewidgets view. List it before StandardWidgetMixin so cooperative get_context_data() can build page content first, then wrap it with the help offcanvas:

from app_help.views import HelpOffcanvasMixin
from wildewidgets import MenuMixin, StandardWidgetMixin
from django.views.generic import TemplateView


class MyPageView(HelpOffcanvasMixin, MenuMixin, StandardWidgetMixin, TemplateView):
    help_page_id = "getting-started/welcome"
    help_book_slug = "user"  # optional; omit to skip book membership checks
    help_offcanvas_title = "Help"
    help_book_url_name = "app-help"  # optional full-book footer link

    def get_content(self):
        # return your Wildewidgets layout
        ...

Configure help per view with class attributes:

Attribute	Purpose
help_root	Override settings.APP_HELP_ROOT
help_page_id	Page to render (required)
help_book_slug	Require the page to be listed in this book
help_offcanvas_id	DOM id for the offcanvas (default help-offcanvas)
help_offcanvas_title	Panel title (default Help)
help_book_url_name	Optional URL name for a full-book help footer link

Override get_help_root(), get_help_page_id(), or get_help_book_slug() when the active page depends on the request.

Full-book help view

Use HelpBookViewMixin on a Wildewidgets view to render the selected book inside your application chrome. Wire it to a project URL named app-help if offcanvas pages should link to it:

from app_help.views import HelpBookViewMixin
from django.urls import path
from django.views.generic import TemplateView
from wildewidgets import MenuMixin, StandardWidgetMixin


class AppHelpView(HelpBookViewMixin, MenuMixin, StandardWidgetMixin, TemplateView):
    help_book_slug = "user"

    def get_help_book_slug(self):
        # Return the book appropriate to request.user.
        return "admin" if self.request.user.is_staff else "user"


urlpatterns = [
    path("help/", AppHelpView.as_view(), name="app-help"),
]

Programmatic use

Render or validate content without a view:

from app_help import HelpEngine

engine = HelpEngine("/path/to/help")

markdown = engine.render_page("getting-started/welcome", book_slug="user")
page = engine.load_page("getting-started/welcome")
book = engine.load_book("user")

engine.validate_page("getting-started/welcome")
engine.validate_book("user")

render_page() expands snippet includes, strips front matter, and optionally verifies that the page belongs to the requested book.

Command-line interface

After installation, the django-app-help command is available for authoring and CI workflows without running Django.

Bootstrap a help tree

django-app-help init
django-app-help init --root /path/to/myapp

This creates help/ with example book, page, and snippet content under the project root (current directory by default).

List and render content

Point the CLI at your help root with --help-root or the APP_HELP_ROOT environment variable. If ./help exists, it is used automatically.

django-app-help --help-root demo/demo/core/help books
django-app-help --help-root demo/demo/core/help pages
django-app-help --help-root demo/demo/core/help pages getting-started/welcome
django-app-help --help-root demo/demo/core/help snippets
django-app-help --help-root demo/demo/core/help show book user

Render a page with optional book membership check:

django-app-help --help-root demo/demo/core/help pages billing/overview --book user

Validate content

django-app-help --help-root demo/demo/core/help validate page billing/overview
django-app-help --help-root demo/demo/core/help validate book user
django-app-help --help-root demo/demo/core/help validate all

Use validate in CI by exporting APP_HELP_ROOT to your help directory.

Demo

The demo/ directory is a small Django project that shows help wired into Academy-themed Wildewidgets pages. It installs this package in editable mode and serves sample content from demo/demo/core/help/.

Run the demo

From the repository root:

uv sync
cd demo
uv sync
uv run python manage.py runserver

Open http://127.0.0.1:8000/. Each sidebar route renders a static demo page with a help offcanvas:

Route	Help book	Help page
/	user	getting-started/welcome
/components/	user	topics/pages
/workflow/	developer	authoring/pages
/status/	admin	admin/validation
/help/	user	Full book

Browse the Markdown under demo/demo/core/help/ to see books, pages, snippets, includes, and link patterns in context. demo/demo/core/views.py shows how HelpOffcanvasMixin composes with StandardWidgetMixin.

Development

Run the library test suite from the repository root:

make pytest

Pass extra pytest arguments after the target:

make pytest ARGS="tests/test_engine.py -v"