Configure a Django project to use a specific database to use when run tests if we can't create databases with the user credential defined in the 'default' one

local_settings.py

# Since we need a syncdb on all the databases, before the tests can be
# runned successfully we need to execute
#
#  $ python manage.py syncdb
#  $ python manage.py syncdb --database=test
#
# otherwise will be errors like
#
#  'django.db.utils.DatabaseError: no such table: django_site'

DATABASES = {
        'default': {
            'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.postgresql_psycopg2',
            'NAME': 'bla',
            'USER': 'foo'
            'PASSWORD': 'bar'
        },
        'test': {
            'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.sqlite3',
            'NAME': 'only4test.sqlite'
        },
}

# http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4650509/different-db-for-testing-in-django
import sys
if 'test' in sys.argv:
    DATABASES['default'] = DATABASES['test'];

Since this came up on my Google search quite high, you should be aware that in Django 3+ you can configure your database like this:

DATABASES = {
        'default': {
            'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.postgresql_psycopg2',
            'NAME': 'bla',
            'USER': 'foo'
            'PASSWORD': 'bar'
            'TEST': {
                'MIRROR': 'test'
            }
        },
        'test': {
            'ENGINE': 'django.db.backends.sqlite3',
            'NAME': 'only4test.sqlite'
        },
}

See the MIRROR description and the Django Advanced Test documentation for details.

thanks @GrazingScientist for the comment, to be fair I forgot this gist existed :P

thanks @GrazingScientist for the comment, to be fair I forgot this gist existed :P

I thought so - after 11 years. ;)

Thanks, all this time I was ignoring the last line of code, very sad to have wasted time on such small things...

i think in last line this should be the code DATABASES['test'] = DATABASES['default']
I am actually trying to give a replica of my db as testing db so i can test my api and database without configuring multiple foriegn keys and appending data accordingly just for test of a put api