title: How do I stop getting ImportError: Could not import settings 'mofin.settings' when using django with wsgi?
body: <p>I can't get wsgi to import my settings file for my project 'mofin'.</p>
  
  <p>The list of errors from the apache error log are as follows</p>
  
  <pre><code>mod_wsgi (pid=4001): Exception occurred within WSGI script '/var/www/wsgi-scripts/django.wsgi'.
  Traceback (most recent call last):
    File "/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/django/core/handlers/wsgi.py", line 228, in __call__
      self.load_middleware()
    File "/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/django/core/handlers/base.py", line 31, in load_middleware
      for middleware_path in settings.MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES:
    File "/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/django/conf/__init__.py", line 28, in __getattr__
      self._import_settings()
    File "/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/django/conf/__init__.py", line 59, in _import_settings
      self._target = Settings(settings_module)
    File "/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/django/conf/__init__.py", line 94, in __init__
      raise ImportError, "Could not import settings '%s' (Is it on sys.path? Does it have syntax errors?): %s" % (self.SETTINGS_MODULE, e)
  ImportError: Could not import settings 'mofin.settings' (Is it on sys.path? Does it have syntax errors?): No module named mofin.settings
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I got the "hello world!" wsgi app listed here(<a href="http://code.google.com/p/modwsgi/wiki/QuickConfigurationGuide" rel="noreferrer">http://code.google.com/p/modwsgi/wiki/QuickConfigurationGuide</a>) to work fine. </p>
  
  <p>The settings.py file loads fine with python manage.py (runserver|shell|syncdb|test store)
  as does the application.</p>
  
  <p>Here is my wsgi file:</p>
  
  <pre><code>import os
  import sys
  sys.path.append('/home/django/mofin/trunk')
  sys.path.append('/home/django/mofin/trunk/mofin')
  print &gt;&gt; sys.stderr, sys.path
  os.environ['DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE'] = 'mofin.settings'
  
  import django.core.handlers.wsgi
  application = django.core.handlers.wsgi.WSGIHandler()
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>the sys.path as printed in the error log is</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>['/usr/lib/python25.zip', '/usr/lib/python2.5', '/usr/lib/python2.5/plat-linux2', '/usr/lib/python2.5/lib-tk', '/usr/lib/python2.5/lib-dynload', '/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages', '/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/gtk-2.0', '/home/django/mofin/trunk', '/home/django/mofin/trunk/mofin']</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>if I open an interactive shell with manage.py, sys.path is</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>['/home/django/mofin/trunk/mofin', '/usr/lib/python25.zip', '/usr/lib/python2.5', '/usr/lib/python2.5/plat-linux2', '/usr/lib/python2.5/lib-tk', '/usr/lib/python2.5/lib-dynload', '/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages', '/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/gtk-2.0']</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>My django settings file looks like this:
      # Django settings for mofin project.</p>
  
  <pre><code>DEBUG = True
  TEMPLATE_DEBUG = DEBUG
  
  ADMINS = (
      # ('Dan xxxx', 'xxxx@yyyyyyyyyy.com'),
  )
  
  MANAGERS = ADMINS
  
  DATABASE_ENGINE = 'mysql'           # 'postgresql_psycopg2', 'postgresql', 'mysql', 'sqlite3' or 'oracle'.
  DATABASE_NAME = 'mofin'             # Or path to database file if using sqlite3.
  DATABASE_USER = 'aaaaaa'             # Not used with sqlite3.
  DATABASE_PASSWORD = 'bbbbbb'         # Not used with sqlite3.
  DATABASE_HOST = ''             # Set to empty string for localhost. Not used with sqlite3.
  DATABASE_PORT = ''             # Set to empty string for default. Not used with sqlite3.
  
  # Local time zone for this installation. Choices can be found here:
  # http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_tz_zones_by_name
  # although not all choices may be available on all operating systems.
  # If running in a Windows environment this must be set to the same as your
  # system time zone.
  TIME_ZONE = 'Europe/London'
  
  # Language code for this installation. All choices can be found here:
  # http://www.i18nguy.com/unicode/language-identifiers.html
  LANGUAGE_CODE = 'en-GB'
  
  SITE_ID = 1
  
  # If you set this to False, Django will make some optimizations so as not
  # to load the internationalization machinery.
  USE_I18N = True
  
  # Absolute path to the directory that holds media.
  # Example: "/home/media/media.lawrence.com/"
  MEDIA_ROOT = '/home/django/media/'
  
  # URL that handles the media served from MEDIA_ROOT. Make sure to use a
  # trailing slash if there is a path component (optional in other cases).
  # Examples: "http://media.lawrence.com", "http://example.com/media/"
  MEDIA_URL = 'http://mofin.mywebsite.co.uk/media/'
  
  # URL prefix for admin media -- CSS, JavaScript and images. Make sure to use a
  # trailing slash.
  # Examples: "http://foo.com/media/", "/media/".
  ADMIN_MEDIA_PREFIX = '/admin_media/'
  
  # Make this unique, and don't share it with anybody.
  SECRET_KEY = 'xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx'
  
  # List of callables that know how to import templates from various sources.
  TEMPLATE_LOADERS = (
      'django.template.loaders.filesystem.load_template_source',
      'django.template.loaders.app_directories.load_template_source',
  #     'django.template.loaders.eggs.load_template_source',
  )
  
  MIDDLEWARE_CLASSES = (
      'django.middleware.common.CommonMiddleware',
      'django.contrib.sessions.middleware.SessionMiddleware',
      'django.contrib.auth.middleware.AuthenticationMiddleware',
  )
  
  ROOT_URLCONF = 'mofin.urls'
  
  TEMPLATE_DIRS = (
      # Put strings here, like "/home/html/django_templates" or "C:/www/django/templates".
      # Always use forward slashes, even on Windows.
      # Don't forget to use absolute paths, not relative paths.
  )
  
  INSTALLED_APPS = (
      'django.contrib.auth',
      'django.contrib.contenttypes',
      'django.contrib.sessions',
      'django.contrib.sites',
      'django.contrib.admin',
      'mofin.store'
  )
  </code></pre>