Fixed #15124 -- Changed the default for BooleanField.

Thanks to the many contributors who updated and improved the patch over
the life of this ticket.

2 files changed, 18 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/docs/ref/models/fields.txt b/docs/ref/models/fields.txt
index 421de74c62..f22436e5fe 100644
--- a/docs/ref/models/fields.txt
+++ b/docs/ref/models/fields.txt
@@ -377,6 +377,10 @@ The default form widget for this field is a
 If you need to accept :attr:`~Field.null` values then use
 :class:`NullBooleanField` instead.
 
+.. versionchanged:: 1.6
+    The default value of ``BooleanField`` was changed from ``False`` to
+    ``None`` when :attr:`Field.default` isn't defined.
+
 ``CharField``
 -------------
 
diff --git a/docs/releases/1.6.txt b/docs/releases/1.6.txt
index db9c597490..f3d12cac38 100644
--- a/docs/releases/1.6.txt
+++ b/docs/releases/1.6.txt
@@ -292,6 +292,20 @@ should either restore Django's defaults at the end of each request, force an
 appropriate value at the beginning of each request, or disable persistent
 connections.
 
+``BooleanField`` no longer defaults to ``False``
+~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
+
+When a :class:`~django.db.models.BooleanField` doesn't have an explicit
+:attr:`~django.db.models.Field.default`, the implicit default value is
+``None``. In previous version of Django, it was ``False``, but that didn't
+represent accurantely the lack of a value.
+
+Code that relies on the default value being ``False`` may raise an exception
+when saving new model instances to the database, because ``None`` isn't an
+acceptable value for a :class:`~django.db.models.BooleanField`. You should
+either specify ``default=False`` explicitly on the field definition, or ensure
+the field is set to ``True`` or ``False`` before saving the object.
+
 Translations and comments in templates
 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~