=========================
Django shortcut functions
=========================

The package ``django.shortcuts`` collects helper functions and classes that
"span" multiple levels of MVC. In other words, these functions/classes
introduce controlled coupling for convenience's sake.

``render_to_response``
======================

``django.shortcuts.render_to_response`` renders a given template with a given
context dictionary and returns an ``HttpResponse`` object with that rendered
text.

Example::

    from django.shortcuts import render_to_response
    r = render_to_response('myapp/template.html', {'foo': 'bar'})

This example is equivalent to::

    from django.http import HttpResponse
    from django.template import Context, loader
    t = loader.get_template('myapp/template.html')
    c = Context({'foo': 'bar'})
    r = HttpResponse(t.render(c))

``get_object_or_404``
=====================

``django.shortcuts.get_object_or_404`` calls ``get()`` on a given model
manager, but it raises ``django.http.Http404`` instead of the model's
``DoesNotExist`` exception.

``get_list_or_404``
===================

``django.shortcuts.get_list_or_404`` returns the result of ``filter()`` on a
given model manager, raising ``django.http.Http404`` if the resulting list is
empty.