uwsgi options --wsgi-file and --module not recognized

Question

I am trying to run a Django app using uwsgi. Most instructions I have found refer to a "--wsgi-file" and "--module" to specify the application, but "uwsgi" makes no mention of these options, and when I try and use them:

uwsgi -s /tmp/uwsgi.sock --master --module myapp.wsgi
uwsgi: unrecognized option '--module'
getopt_long() error

And

uwsgi -s /tmp/uwsgi.sock --master --wsgi-file myapp/wsgi.py
uwsgi: unrecognized option '--wsgi-file'
getopt_long() error

When I run it without either, I get:

uwsgi -s /tmp/uwsgi.sock --master 
*** Starting uWSGI 2.0.9 (64bit) on [Fri Jul 10 11:12:04 2015] ***
compiled with version: 4.4.7 20120313 (Red Hat 4.4.7-11) on 23 April 2015 19:31:15
os: Linux-2.6.32-504.16.2.el6.x86_64 #1 SMP Tue Mar 10 17:01:00 EDT 2015
machine: x86_64
clock source: unix
pcre jit disabled
detected number of CPU cores: 2
detected binary path: /usr/sbin/uwsgi
your processes number limit is 1024
your memory page size is 4096 bytes
detected max file descriptor number: 1024
lock engine: pthread robust mutexes
thunder lock: disabled (you can enable it with --thunder-lock)
uwsgi socket 0 bound to UNIX address /tmp/uwsgi.sock fd 5
your server socket listen backlog is limited to 100 connections
your mercy for graceful operations on workers is 60 seconds
mapped 145536 bytes (142 KB) for 1 cores
*** Operational MODE: single process ***
*** no app loaded. going in full dynamic mode ***
*** uWSGI is running in multiple interpreter mode ***
spawned uWSGI master process (pid: 26597)
spawned uWSGI worker 1 (pid: 26598, cores: 1)

Why aren't these options recognized? How am I supposed to specify the app to load? What kind of garbage software is this? Should I go back to using Gunicorn?

Answer 1

This means that the python plugin for uWSGI isn't installed or loaded. To verify run:

$ uwsgi --plugins-list

In general if you have build-essential python-dev etc., you can install via:

$ pip install uwsgi

On Debian or Ubuntu you can also install it via:

$ apt-get install uwsgi-plugin-python

On Linux Alpine you currently have to specify where it is:

$ apk add --update uwsgi-python
$ uwsgi --plugins-dir /usr/lib/uwsgi/ --need-plugin python --plugins-list
*** uWSGI loaded generic plugins ***

*** uWSGI loaded request plugins ***
0: python
...

Alternatively you can specify its full path via:

$ uwsgi --plugin /usr/lib/uwsgi/python_plugin.so --plugins-list