Welcome to the lesson on retrieving all records using Django ORM. In previous lessons, we've covered the basics of CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) operations. Now, we will delve deeper into the Read aspect, focusing on fetching data from your database. Retrieving data efficiently can significantly enhance the performance and usability of your application.

In this lesson, we will explore how to retrieve all the records from your database using Django ORM. Understanding how to fetch all records is essential for scenarios where you need to display a list of tasks, users, or any other data stored in your database.

We'll use a simple Todo model for our examples. Here’s a quick look at the model:

Python
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1from django.db import models
2
3class Todo(models.Model):
4    task = models.CharField(max_length=200)
5    completed = models.BooleanField(default=False)
6
7    def __str__(self):
8        return self.task

To retrieve all the records from the Todo model, we use the all() method provided by Django ORM. Here’s how we achieve that in a view function:

Python
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1from django.http import JsonResponse
2from .models import Todo
3
4def get_todos(request):
5    todos = Todo.objects.all().values()
6    return JsonResponse(list(todos), safe=False)

This function retrieves all Todo objects and returns them as a JSON response, making it easy to integrate with front-end applications.

Why is learning to retrieve all records important? In many applications, you will often need to display a list of items to the user. For example, an e-commerce site may need to show all products, or a task management app may need to list all tasks. Being adept at fetching data efficiently ensures your app performs well and provides a smooth user experience.

With a solid grasp of data retrieval, you can build dynamic features that respond to user interactions, such as displaying a user's activities, orders, or messages. Understanding this concept is a foundational skill that you will use in almost every Django project you work on.

Let's proceed to the practice section and apply what we've learned by retrieving all Todo records from our database. Exciting times are ahead!