EVE Technology Lab

composer will help a great deal.

Along with storing your code in Git.

Build it in libraries which you include into your main project with composer, with the referencing being handled by packagist so you can run a 'composer update' to grab the latest release versions of the library (but not the trunk)

Then deployment of the main code is switching the git tag, and updating to it.

Automagically updating the database will be painful

Thank you to both of you!

I am quite inexperienced in the git / composer stuff. The last time I have used a source code control, it has been SVN.

There's a missing link in what you said (or maybe not, I just don't see it): the testing.

I mean, at the moment I am doing this:

1) I write code in my Windows box. I don't have a development environment, because I have many daemons and processes that are hard to replicate in Windows. I code from different computers in different locations. Such is life when you are a RL securities trader who develops at home but also on the beach and wherever else

2) So when I save, NetBeans uploads the code to a (series of) folders on the Ubuntu box.

3) These folders are the production tree so I am basically coding on the "live" website. In reality it's not live yet, since the website is not published anywhere.

4) I run unit tests (also in a folder in there), mainly through PHPUnit, they test the production tree.

5) Once tests pass I can see the website by going to the ip address or FQDN of the website.


And I need to switch to this:

1) Write code like at point 1 above. Possibly done by more than 1 person.

2) The code goes in a development tree. I suppose I can make a sister directory to "public_html" called "dev_html" or similar and make the saved code go there.

3) I need to make the development code point to a development database (I won't also spawn a dedicated development database server instance).

4) Once I have saved my stuff on that development tree I need a way to make it "show" in something like: "dev.domain.tld". I will put a password on it of course.

Basically I want to see the stuff working, BEFORE I make it merge onto the production version.

5) Only then, I would use something (you suggest git) to deploy development to production.


How do I cover all these steps? Am I missing something?

Well lets see if I might be able to help clear this up for you.

Testing - I have 2 types of sites with my work. One is the main (Live site) the other is a testing site. Most my testing sites are a subdomain off main my domain e.g. dev.example.com. The way this gets tested is everyone who goes to it knows the data could be deleted/removed at any time without reason.

Currently at the moment I see your saying you write code on many devices or just one? Because I personally use 4 devices all of them are using Git so you can imagine all the commits I have in my git Repo. I am not a fan of netbeans but if you understand it awesome! I use Sublime text 2 and that helps me keep my environment from one device to the next with its own project plan configuration.

With git you need to not use it like you did SVN....You use Tags and branches in git where SVN used Folders. I will have a Develop branch on my git repo to break apart what is available for the live site and for the development site. From there I have a post-commit hook to push all the changes to my development site then i go do some testing then if it works i merge the branch into the live production branch of my git server and it pushes to my live site.

If you need help feel free to hit me up in game or eve mail me.

Thank you again, very much!

I think Devilen's approach is the most similar to what I intend to do.

It looks like I'll have to install git and see how it works, it's still not clear (to me) how it's meant to get files in from me and then check them out to development (and later production). But I'll learn.

Thanks also for the database tips, I'll see how much time that approach takes to be implemented.

To transfer files with Git:

Clone the repository to all three locations. (one off step)

Commit in your development environment.
Push them to your master repository
Pull them to your test environment

When you're happy, create a new tag in your master repository.
check out that tag to your live environment.

Well, /I/ don't/ But that's because I'm bad and tend to just do my development on my live environment Though for the libraries I develop, I use tags for versions. Mostly because packagist tracks the trunk for development versions, and uses tags for release versions.

How do you do that CCp FoxFour? via a CI (continuous integration) platform? We use TeamCity for EVEMon and have set a release process and a snapshot one.

Yea I use Bitbucket personally as well with Git, they work pretty well for me and my one man projects.

Instead of creating a shared development environment on your server I highly recommend setting up a vagrant environment instead. This allows all developers to host their own development VM. With vagrant all you need to do is to create a script that will bootstrap a vanilla e.g. ubuntu image with all server components you need. Afterwards you just need to send the vagrant config to the developers to allow them replicate the dev system.

It is hard to make suggestions with the given parameters.
There already have been a couple of generic suggestions (tagging/branching vs CI environments vs isolation containers (docker/vagrant)).
It pretty much depends what you mean by "big" (as in data or processing power or bandwidth).

Personally i would also stay away from PHP and start off with scalable technology (like node.js or azure).