At the moment I am using poor method to work at home and at work to do web development.
I use Wamp for testing/development and then I upload to a production web server (Linux) via FTP.
If I continue with the project at home, I have to download the files from FTP.
What is good method to work on same projects at multiple locations?
Someone suggest me to learn Git and get Github private account. Also suggested to get Vagrant installed at work and home. Do I need to install Git in Vagrant VM or local machine?
Learn git: http://try.github.io
Create a Vagrant/VrtualBox VM by following the directions at https://puphpet.com
One of the tricks here is to put the Vagrant stuff you get from Puphpet directly in your project and then commit all of it to git. You'll then be able to check out the project in a new environment and, as long as Vagrant and VirtualBox are installed, you can run vagrant up and be working in about 5 mins.
Here's an example of how I'm doing just that to allow people to easily try out a library I've written: https://github.com/jeremykendall/query-auth-impl.
Enjoy! Your life as a developer is about to get a lot easier and a whole lot better.
Github or Bitbucket. Git or Mercurial, and also Svn if it's just for yourself and you want an easier learning curve.
Any source control system would be ideal for this.
You don't want your production server to be the source of truth for the actual code. Those two concerns should definitely be separated. The production application is the output of the code, not the code itself. For a language like PHP the two may be identical, but the concerns themselves should still be separated. Indeed, for small systems the two services may even be hosted on the same server, but should still be logically separated.
The source control system maintains the changes made to the code over time, the production server is a snapshot of the current release version of the code.
Related
We are a team of 4 web developers working at the same time on a project located in localhost [each one of us has a copy of the project]. So what we are doing is using a really primitive technique to upgrade it, we work on our copy and once per week we gather everyone's work, which is a HUGE HEADACHE. So I would like to configure phpStorm to connect to the team leader local server and work directly from there, so the project will always be updated.
I recommend downloading git gui tool(or sourcetree). Create a repo on one of your servers or host it on github. Git GUI tool should be able to guide you through the whole process. If Git GUI is a little confusing, try SourceTree which is a little bit more user-friendly.
It would be easier for all of you to create a Git Repository and collaborate your work.
I am an avid webdev hobbyist and freelance, up until now I simply edit the website live (put a maintenance message up while its being made), now all my projects up until now have also been very small.
eg I make a site, show em, take money and go, I've never had to work on a site after it's gone live.
Now my new project is pretty big and I know I will have to edit it after its gone live and maybe have a small team of devs (atm just me)
So how do people professionally handle this? I know I will need a prefix-amp app cos i run an apache server, I've also heared that people use github for versioning, but I'm not really sure because apparently its not svn?
Thanks
ps. I have a windows 7 pc, so no mac apps please
up until now i simply edit the website live
Terrible in my book ;)
so how do people professionally handle this?
First you need to setup a development server (it would be best to keep it as close as possible to the expected live environments). On this server you would install all the software you need.
You may also want to setup a staging server.
i know i will need a prefix-amp app
I hope you are not talking about those one click installers. If you would do it professionally you should install everything yourself that way you can set it up the way you need it.
ive also heared that people use github for versioning, but im not really sure because apparently its not svn?
GitHub is just a website. What you are looking for is git or svn for versioning. You could also setup a git or svn server locally instead of using services like GitHub. Basically what versioning is is that when somebody makes a change to the code he/she would need commit the changes. This way it is easy to keep track of changes in the codebase (like what was changed, when was it changed and by whom).
Local XAMP-stack (LAMP, or WAMP) for development
intranet-system for test and maybe staging
Of course the live system
Versioncontrol, I prefer git. Of course you can use SVN too, but... lets say: It's SVN.
Make changes local, test this changes local
everythings fine: Push it into the "master" vcs-repository
New version ready (or it's "sunday-night-release-time")? Push all that stuff on test/stage
Everythings fine there too: Push it into the live system
Thats very shortened of course, but it should give you an idea.
The tool where you manage your software version is not that important. Use Git, or SVN or whatever, the one you like most. But use _one_.
Equally important is that you run the "page" on two sites, a test and a live system, strictly apart. Both systems have to be very close in their layout, all changes must first be done in the test system, be verified and then done in the same manner in the live system. Do not allow changes only to be made to the live system ('cause it's just a small change'). No exceptions.
Then think about deployment: how will you transfer changed files to the target system ? You need routines for this, that run once started and don't forget a step in between.
Firstly you need some kind of versioning system: either SVN or Git. GitHub is simply an online service that provides managed Git repositories. Secondly you need a development server.
If it were just you doing development, you could host both of these on your local desktop PC, but since other developers are going to be joining, you need a remote server. If you don't want to be running a server out of your home, the best option is a VPS (virtual private server) on which you can install Git, Apache, etc. and anything else you need.
As for development software, take your pick- there are loads of options. A common choice is the NetBeans IDE and TortoiseGit combo. You use NetBeans to develop your code on, automatically uploading to your development server, then you TortoiseGit to commit and sync changes.
Only when you're ready to go live do you copy the code from the dev server to the production server.
I've inherited a significantly sized internal app at the company I work for. It has two parts. One runs on a LAMP server, the other runs on a WAMP server. There is no source control to be seen.
Currently, developers will log into each server via FTP and just directly edit the PHP files that are there. Or log into phpMyAdmin and make changes to DB schema where necessary.
What is the best way to implement some source control into this situation? I'm not very knowledgeable on how to best setup CVS ans SVN. Would all developers need their own "test system"? Meaning, would I have to setup a LAMP+WAMP enviornment for each developer? Or can they would off a central dev server? What is the best way to deploy changes that have been made?
Developers all use Windows. We also use Zend Studio 5.5 for development.
Thank you in advance for any advice.
It's really not a lot of effort for a developer to have a personal LAMP/WAMP running locally or in a VM. A local dev server is worth having for testing non-live changes in a closely matched environment but it doesn't really scale if all developers are making their changes on that at once.
I'd have all developers committing to trunk in Subversion and then have a stable branch which is automatically (using a post-commit hook) deployed onto the server. Only certain people should have write access to the stable branch to ensure a junior developer doesn't accidentally screw the live server.
That's a horrible way to work on websites, especially with a team. The whole setup should be changed.
The source code should live somewhere else, and then get deployed to the website when it's ready. You could have a script that does the deployment and whatnot (copy the files over ssh, plus any other setup if needed, etc). The point is: no one should ever edit files directly on the production server.
So we are pushing to create good processes in our office. I work in a web shop that has been doing web sites for over a decade. And we don't use version control. I know! It's bad, not my fault. I'm the guy with a SoftE background pushing for this at a minimum.
The tech lead has been looking into it. We all use Mac workstations and mostly use Coda for editing since it is a great IDE. It has SVN support built in but expects it to work on local files. We're trying to explore mounting the web directory as a local network drive with an SFTP tool.
We are a LAMP shop, BTW.
I am wondering what the model is here. I think we have typically would checkout the whole site to our local machine where we have apache running and then test it there? This isn't how we work yet, we do everything on the server. We've looked at checking things in and out, but some files are owned by apache and the ownerships change when I check them in, because I'm not apache.
I just want to know a way to do this that works given my circumstances. Would be nice to not have to run apache locally.
You might want to checkout the Coda mailing list and ask there. Lots of Coda enthusiasts there with specific experience.
If you don't want to have to run locally could make Apache on your server run a copy of the site for every developer, on a different port per person, and then mount those web-roots to the local macs and make that the working directory. If you're a small shop that's not hard to manage. I find that pretty easy to set up and saves a lot of resources on the local machines. The one-site-per-person helps to avoid conflicts with multiple people working on files at the same time.
What I'd additionally recommend is to have a script that gets the latest changes from SVN and deploys the entire site to the production server when you're ready. You could have that script change permissions on appropriate files/folders as needed to be owned by Apache. The idea once you're using source control is to never manually edit the production files -- you should have something that deploys it from SVN for you.
A few notes:
Take a look at MacFuse / MacFusion (the latter is the application, the former is the library behind it) to mount remote directories via SSH / FTP as local ones.
Allow your developers to check out into their local environment (with their own LAMP stack if they're savvy), or look into a shared dev environment with individual jails. This way your developers can run their own LAMP stack (which you could deploy for them on the machine) without interfering with others.
The idea being, let them use a workflow that works best for them, to minimize the pain in adapting to this change (if change management might be an issue!)
Just as an example, we have a shared dev server where jails are created with a single command for new developers. They have a full LAMP stack ready to go, and we can upgrade and re-deploy jails easily to keep software up to date. Developers have individual control to add custom settings / extensions if they need it for work, while the sys admins have the ability to reset everything when someone accidently breaks their environment :)
Those who prefer not to use jails, and are able to, manage their own local environments (typically through Macports or MAMP).
I've read a number of topics in the same sort of ballpark as this one, but in all honesty I'm still not exactly sure on the best approach (as a starting point). I am a solo developer in a small office and I have around 30 websites which are hosted on a linux VPS. I want to start using using version control (probably SVN) and also set up a staging server. At the moment, I do development either locally on my machine before using FTP to upload to the live server, or ocassionally for small changes I edit the remote files directly, which is not an ideal approach.
I'm looking for some guidance on how to improve my development environment. I imagine I should be installing SVN on the web server, which would then allow me to check out versions to my local machine (which would also require SVN i think). Also, if I want to set up a staging server, should I just set up subdomains for each of the live websites, then use these subdomains for showing clients changes to the site before making them live?
Hope this makes sense!
This is what we do at work:
We have a staging server running Apache and a Subversion server. We have a post commit hook that updates a working copy in the htdocs directory, that way, when a developer commits something it automatically gets updated on the staging server, so everyone can see the latest code.
On the client's production servers (the ones we can control) we have the Subversion client installed and the website is a working copy. When we need to update the live site we login to a shell and run svn up. If you do something like this, make sure to limit access to the .svn directories, either with .htaccess files or from the main Apache config.
We have a custom app that manages the projects, but that is only because we're lazy and don't want to setup each project by hand, the app creates the necessary directories and working copies. You could write a quick script to do this.
We never, ever, edit files via FTP on the live site. All in all we have been using this setup for almost 2 years and aside from the occasional conflict on the staging server, we never have had any problems.
You can actually install the SVN server on your local machine, which I would recommend in lieu of installing it on the web server (assuming you make backups). The easiest thing to do, since it’s only you using it, would be to use the file:// protocol, but using svnserve is a little more robust, and the preferred method if you want to take the time to do it.
#Michael, I disagree - I would say it's better to install on the linux vps, especially if you are already paying for the hosting service. I find it very helpful to be able to browse and download stuff from my svn repo wherever I am, from whatever computer I'm on.
#nicky, I started with svn (and version control) several years ago and I took baby steps which made it easier to tackle.
If I had to do it over again, I'd read the svn book to start with. The book is very well laid out and didn't take more than 1-2 days to plow thru.
While you're reading, install svn on your linux vps with an apache front end.
Once you have that up, pick one of your websites and import it into svn. This is how I structure my svn repo. For example, say my repo is hosted at http://mysvn.mydomain.com/svn/:
mywebsite1
- trunk
- tags
- branches
mywebsite2
- trunk
- tags
- branches
Don't worry about creating the perfect structure. It's pretty easy to re-organize especially when you're starting out. After you import a few projects into svn, you'll start to get a feel for which projects should have their own "trunk/tags/branches" dir structure and which can be combined.
For creating test environments, I do exactly what you describe. I use build scripts to checkout from svn and download files into dirs that are mapped to subdomains like "test.clientsite.com" (I work primarily in java and use ant and maven, but I think you can use whatever scripting language you're familiar with).
Once you get used to version control, you'll never go back, good luck!