Fix AttributeError when AUDITLOG_LOGENTRY_MODEL is not set (#788)

[jgillard]

I hope I'm not stepping on toes with this, but I was following the issue thread and thought I'd give it a go. This is Claude Opus 4.5 assisted. I have verified that this fix works with my Django project. The Claude summary is below.

Summary

• Fixed AttributeError: 'Settings' object has no attribute 'AUDITLOG_LOGENTRY_MODEL' that occurs when upgrading to 3.4.0+ without explicitly setting AUDITLOG_LOGENTRY_MODEL
• Added regression test to prevent this issue from recurring

Problem

When Django's admin autodiscover imports auditlog/admin.py → mixins.py, the get_logentry_model() function is called at module load time before conf.py has a chance to apply the default value.

Solution

Use getattr() with the default value directly in get_logentry_model():

model_string = getattr(settings, "AUDITLOG_LOGENTRY_MODEL", "auditlog.LogEntry")

This ensures the default is available regardless of import order, while still respecting user-defined custom values.

Changes

• auditlog/__init__.py: Add getattr() fallback in get_logentry_model()
• auditlog_tests/tests.py: Add regression test test_logentry_model_default_when_setting_missing

Fixes #788

[codecov]

Codecov Report

✅ All modified and coverable lines are covered by tests.
✅ Project coverage is 95.92%. Comparing base (6612503) to head (726444b).
⚠️ Report is 1 commits behind head on master.

Additional details and impacted files

@@           Coverage Diff           @@
##           master     #789   +/-   ##
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  Coverage   95.92%   95.92%           
=======================================
  Files          35       35           
  Lines        1251     1252    +1     
=======================================
+ Hits         1200     1201    +1     
  Misses         51       51           

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[jgillard]

A second approach was to simply change

from django.conf import settings

to

from auditlog.conf import settings

inside auditlog/__init__.py, but I don't understand the implications of this as well, but will change to this approach that avoids the duplication of the default value if that's preferred.

[2ykwang]

I've confirmed this fix resolves the issue!
One minor concern with the first approach: the default value would be managed in two places, which increases maintenance overhead.
In my opinion, the second option might be better. Since settings is conventionally associated with django.conf.settings, using an alias could help avoid confusion:

from auditlog.conf import settings as auditlog_settings

What do you think?

@jgillard

[jgillard]

Thanks for taking a look! I agree about the duplication. How confident are you in the alternative approach? I'm not a regular package contributor and I would hate for that change to cause someone an issue downstream. I just don't know the implications of that change, so was hoping for someone with Django package experience to ok it.

[2ykwang]

@hramezani do you have any other ideas on this?

[hramezani]

Thanks @jgillard for the fix. the current approach LGTM

@2ykwang please merge the PR and make the patch release