Loading commands from modules: '"There is no app here. This is unlikely to work."'

[nfarrar]

I attempted to refactor my application so that commands are stored in individual modules and loaded by a function. I thought this should work, but the following exceptions are being raised - and I'm not quite sure why:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "./manage.py", line 14, in <module>
    register_commands(app, manager)
  File "~/Documents/Projects/flaskproject/cli.py", line 51, in register_commands
    cmd_mod = importlib.import_module(cmd_mod_str)
  File "/usr/local/Cellar/python/2.7.10_2/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/lib/python2.7/importlib/__init__.py", line 37, in import_module
    __import__(name)
  File "~/Documents/Projects/flaskproject/commands/debug.py", line 14, in <module>
    'debug': DebugCommand()
  File "~/.cache/virtualenvs/project/lib/python2.7/site-packages/flask_script/__init__.py", line 148, in __call__
    raise Exception("There is no app here. This is unlikely to work.")
Exception: There is no app here. This is unlikely to work.

Here's the basic structure/pattern I'm attempting to use (irrelevant bits removed):

manage.py:

from flaskapp.app import create_app
from flaskapp.cli import create_manager

app = create_app()
manager = create_manager(app)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    manager.run()

flaskapp/app.py:

from flask import Flask
from .config import configure_app
from .extensions import configure_extensions

def create_app(cfg=None):
    app = Flask(__name__)
    configure_app(app)
    configure_extensions(app)
    return app

flaskapp/cli.py:

def create_manager(app):
    manager = Manager(app, with_default_commands=False)

    env = app.config['ENV']
    root_pkg = os.path.basename(app.config['APP_ROOT'])
    pkg_path = os.path.join(root_pkg, cmd_dir)
    pkg_name = root_pkg + '.' + cmd_dir

    for _, mod_name, _ in pkgutil.iter_modules([pkg_path]):
        mod_name =  pkg_name + '.' + mod_name
        mod = importlib.import_module(mod_name)
        if hasattr(mod, 'commands'):
            for name, cmd in mod.commands.items():
                manager.add_command(name, cmd)

    return manager

flaskapp/commands/clean.py:

from flask_script.commands import Clean

commands = {
    'clean': Clean()
}

The purpose is so that I can just drop a new module containing a new command to add to the application in the commands dir - and it's completely self-contained - it'll be loaded without me having to jump around and modify several other files.

Any suggestions?

[joshmreesjones]

I had a similar problem (but I wasn't trying to put commands in individual modules). app was None, and when I fixed that it worked. Maybe the same would work for you.