[Django]-What is the best system to run django on?

I’ll lay my head on the chopping block and suggest, that, probably, Apache with mod_wsgi for django and some other web server (lighttpd?) for static content, would be the most generic solution.

There are lots of options besides this one, Google App Engine being one of them, though, all of them are specific to the application you are going to deploy and the way it is going to be used.

The Google App Engine hits most of your requirements, mainly those about costs, maintenance, robustness and reliability. However that does not imply it is the best platform to run Django on, but it is one option for you.

If you want to consider this option, you may want to start by checking out the following:

• Stack Overflow: Django on Google App Engine
• Stack Overflow: Django and App Engine
• Google Code: Running Django on Google App Engine
• YouTube: Google I/O 2008 – Python, Django, and App Engine
• Django on Google App Engine in 13 simple steps

It should be stressed that Google App Engine is fundamentally different from a typical Django environment. This issue differs from a “Debian vs some other distro”, “PostGre vs MySQL” or “lighttpd vs nginx” type choice since choosing App Engine most probably will require you to write code specific to it or make modifications in your existing code base.

You should look at what Google AppEngine provides and requires (and what not) and consider whether App Engine is suitable for your application. It might be an uneasy u-turn if you see that App Engine is not the correct choice after you are halfway through.

It’s impossible to tell which is the best system to run Django on, but IMO: if you anticipate lot’s of pageviews, go with nginx/lighttpd for webserver instead of Apache if you don’t need those fancy Apache modules.

However, since I’m used to apache, it was faster for me to configure the site to run on Apache and switch to nginx when performance problems occured.