Add gunicorn and Whitenoise, and set up Dockerfile-aws and entrypoint-aws.sh

[fyliu]

Overview

Set up a production-ready Docker configuration for AWS deployment using gunicorn as the WSGI server and Whitenoise for static file serving. This builds on the split requirements from the previous issue.

Action Items

• Add gunicorn and whitenoise to app/requirements-aws.in
• Recompile app/requirements-aws.txt
• Create or update app/Dockerfile-aws to:
  • Use requirements-aws.txt instead of requirements.txt
  • Run python manage.py collectstatic --noinput during the build
  • (Use single-stage build for now—optimization comes later)
• Create or update app/entrypoint-aws.sh to:
  • Run database migrations if needed
  • Start gunicorn as the WSGI server (e.g., gunicorn peopledepot.wsgi:application --bind 0.0.0.0:8000)
• Update app/peopledepot/settings.py to configure Whitenoise:
  • Add 'whitenoise.middleware.WhiteNoiseMiddleware' to MIDDLEWARE (near the top, after SecurityMiddleware)
  • Set STATIC_ROOT and STATIC_URL appropriately
  • Optionally configure WHITENOISE_AUTOREFRESH or other Whitenoise settings
• Test that the Dockerfile builds successfully and the entrypoint runs without errors

Acceptance Criteria

• Dockerfile-aws builds successfully and uses requirements-aws.txt
• entrypoint-aws.sh exists and starts gunicorn
• Whitenoise is configured in Django settings
• Static files are collected during the Docker build
• The app starts and serves static files when the container runs
• Single-stage build (no multi-stage optimization yet)

References

• Django static files guide
• Whitenoise in Docker Deployment
• How to test whitenoise config
• Deploying whitenoise where django is not at the root of the domain

Parent Issue: #219
Blocked by: #219 sub-issue "Split requirements into dev and AWS"