Installation

Step-by-step instructions

Install the django-tailwind package via pip:

python -m pip install django-tailwind

Alternatively, you can install the latest development version via:

python -m pip install git+https://github.com/timonweb/django-tailwind.git

Add 'tailwind' to INSTALLED_APPS in settings.py:

INSTALLED_APPS = [
  # other Django apps
  'tailwind',
]

Create a Tailwind CSS compatible Django app, I like to call it theme:
```
python manage.py tailwind init
```

Add your newly created 'theme' app to INSTALLED_APPS in settings.py:

INSTALLED_APPS = [
  # other Django apps
  'tailwind',
  'theme'
]

Register the generated 'theme' app by adding the following line to settings.py file:
```
TAILWIND_APP_NAME = 'theme'
```
Make sure that the INTERNAL_IPS list is present in the settings.py file and contains the 127.0.0.1 ip address:
```
INTERNAL_IPS = [
    "127.0.0.1",
]
```
Install Tailwind CSS dependencies, by running the following command:
```
python manage.py tailwind install
```
The Django Tailwind comes with a simple base.html template located at your_tailwind_app_name/templates/base.html. You can always extend or delete it if you already have a layout.
If you are not using the base.html template that comes with Django Tailwind, add {% tailwind_css %} to the base.html template:
```
{% load static tailwind_tags %}
...
<head>
   ...
   {% tailwind_css %}
   ...
</head>
```
The {% tailwind_css %} tag includes Tailwind’s stylesheet.
Let’s also add and configure django_browser_reload, which takes care of automatic page and css refreshes in the development mode. Add it to INSTALLED_APPS in settings.py:
```
INSTALLED_APPS = [
  # other Django apps
  'tailwind',
  'theme',
  'django_browser_reload'
]
```
Staying in settings.py, add the middleware:
```
MIDDLEWARE = [
  # ...
  "django_browser_reload.middleware.BrowserReloadMiddleware",
  # ...
]
```
The middleware should be listed after any that encode the response, such as Django’s GZipMiddleware. The middleware automatically inserts the required script tag on HTML responses before </body> when DEBUG is True.

Include django_browser_reload URL in your root url.py:

from django.urls import include, path
urlpatterns = [
    ...,
    path("__reload__/", include("django_browser_reload.urls")),
]

Finally, you should be able to use Tailwind CSS classes in HTML. Start the development server by running the following command in your terminal:
```
python manage.py tailwind start
```
Check out the Usage section for information about the production mode.

Optional configurations

Content (formerly Purge) rules configuration

The content section of your tailwind.config.js file is where you configure the paths to all of your HTML templates, JavaScript components, and any other source files that contain Tailwind class names.

Depending on your project structure, you might need to configure the content rules in tailwind.config.js. This file is in the static_src folder of the theme app created by python manage.py tailwind init {APP_NAME}.

For example, your theme/static_src/tailwind.config.js file might look like this:

module.exports = {
    content: [
        // Templates within theme app (e.g. base.html)
        '../templates/**/*.html',
        // Templates in other apps
        '../../templates/**/*.html',
        // Ignore files in node_modules
        '!../../**/node_modules',
        // Include JavaScript files that might contain Tailwind CSS classes
        '../../**/*.js',
        // Include Python files that might contain Tailwind CSS classes
        '../../**/*.py'
    ],
    ...
}

Note that you may need to adjust those paths to suit your specific project layout. It is crucial to make sure that all HTML files (or files containing HTML content, such as .vue or .jsx files) are covered by the content rule.

For more information about setting content, check out the “Content Configuration” page of the Tailwind CSS docs: https://tailwindcss.com/docs/content-configuration.

Configuration of the path to the `npm` executable

Tailwind CSS requires Node.js to be installed on your machine. Node.js is a JavaScript runtime that allows you to run JavaScript code outside the browser. Most (if not all) of the current frontend tools depend on Node.js.

If you don’t have Node.js installed on your machine, please follow installation instructions from the official Node.js page.

Sometimes (especially on Windows), the Python executable cannot find the npm binary installed on your system. In this case, you need to set the path to the npm executable in settings.py file manually (Linux/Mac):

NPM_BIN_PATH = '/usr/local/bin/npm'

On Windows it might look like this:

NPM_BIN_PATH = r"C:\Program Files\nodejs\npm.cmd"

Please note that the path to the npm executable may be different for your system. To get the npm path, try running the command which npm in your terminal.

Installation

Step-by-step instructions

Optional configurations

Content (formerly Purge) rules configuration

Configuration of the path to the npm executable

Configuration of the path to the `npm` executable