Automating Web Application Deployment
- 1. Automating Web Application Deployment Mathew Byrne - July 2011
- 2. Introduction • What is the problem? • What is deployment? • Web application life-cycle. • My background — JB Interactive. • How we automated deployment. • Benefits and business case.
- 3. Why Automate Deployment? • Automated, repeatable, consistent process. • Light-weight code changes. • Manage configurations and environments. • Minimise human error. • Saves time == higher efficiency • Standardise across projects.
- 4. Deployment Tools • Lots of tools already in existence: • Fabric (python) • Capistrano (ruby) • Rake (ruby) • make (C) • Not many established PHP solutions…
- 5. Phing • PHing Is Not Gnu make • A build tool; not just a deploy tool. • Uses XML configuration to automate tasks. • Based on Apache Ant. • Used by Propel, Symfony, Zend Framework, Xinc…
- 6. Why Use Phing? • Written in pure PHP - easy to hack! • Minimal dependancies. • Supported, moderate ongoing development. • Functionality through extending.
- 7. What Can Phing do? • Almost anything! • Version Control - Subversion, git, etc. • PHPUnit/Testing • Code analysis • Compilation and Minification • File Manipulation • And much, much more…
- 8. Phing Basics • Project - build.xml • Targets • Dependency tracking. • Tasks • Phing building blocks. • Usually this is where you extend.
- 9. Phing Basics • Properties • User variables! • Can be stored in external files and included at run-time. • Can differ between builds, environments and configurations. • Can be overwritten at run-time
- 10. Hello World! <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <project name="hello-world" default="greet"> <property name="message" value="Hello World!" /> <target name="prepare"> <echo>Preparing your greeting...</echo> </target> <target name="greet" depends="prepare"> <echo msg="${message}" /> </target> </project>
- 11. Hello World!
- 12. Config Management • Using properties separates tasks from environments. • Allows for more generic deploy setups. prop <?xml prop development.ini prop test.ini build.xml production.ini
- 13. Extending Phing • As simple as extending a base class and pointing to it in your build script. • Lots of extensions already in existence. • Read through phing documentation. • Search GitHub for “phing” • Easy to integrate with existing tools. https://github.com/mathewbyrne/closure-task
- 14. Environments • Defined by configuration. • Should have sensible defaults. • Activated by deployment process. • Important - can be a security issue! development staging production
- 15. Deploying with Version Control • Websites are more than just <code> • Configuration • User Content • Assets • Setup • Databases Schemas • Version Control is easy, but not flexible. • Deployment procedure not in VC.
- 16. Database Migrations • Migrations == Database versioning. • Automation required. • Should be part of the deployment process.
- 17. Conclusion • Automated deployment is highly desirable. • Lots of tools in existence. • Environment and configuration are important. • Automate everything!