From the comments: > The biggest issue I have is that model syncing fails > silently (it's as if the app doesn't exist) if an > import in the app models file

From the comments: > The biggest issue I have is that model syncing fails > silently (it's as if the app doesn't exist) if an > import in the app models file dies with an exception > (for instance, not found). I've wasted hours trying to figure out those kinds of silent failures... it's not much fun. Another one that stopped me in my tracks for about an hour is that an app must have a models.py file to run unit tests, even if your application doesn't have any models. If it's not there, instead of just saying 'models.py not found' it says something like 'application <your app name> could not be found'. As others have said though, I guess that's the price you pay for the luxury of having a framework to do the low-level dirty work for you.