[Building Sakai] Dev/Production Setup

[Brandon Davie]

Thanks everyone for your responses. It's helped me get a better grasp on the
build/deploy process.

Sean,

We'll be running MySQL for both development and production. We used HSQLDB
for the pilot demo and would much rather move to MySQL for production.

Thanks for the tips on tracking local changes. We already have a local
subversion server set up to track revisions in other software, so we'll look
at setting up a new repository for our local dev installs.

I appreciate your detailed response.
    

Brandon Davie
Programmer
The Schools of McKeel Academy
(863) 499 2818 EXT 222


> From: Sean Keesler <sean.keesler at threecanoes.com>
> Date: Sun, 20 Jun 2010 12:41:01 -0400
> To: Brandon Davie <brandondavie at mckeelacademy.com>
> Cc: <sakai-dev at collab.sakaiproject.org>
> Subject: Re: [Building Sakai] Dev/Production Setup
> 
> Brandon,
> 
> You didn't mention a database server for each environment. You
> wouldn't want to run HSQLDB for production and you probably would want
> to use the same thing in your development/test environment.
> 
> The one thing you'll bang your heads against is the way you will keep
> track of your local changes. There have been a number of ways I've
> heard of schools doing this, and it probably depends on the scope of
> your local changes as to what method you use.
> Many of us would add a local subversion server for your local build.
> 
> So, the process would go something like:
> 
>  - Grab a tag or branch of Sakai from the community subversion server
>  - Check in that version to your local subversion server
>  - Make modifications and check them in to your local subversion repo
>  - QA test your own local build with your users on your dev box
>  - deploy acceptable builds to your production instance
> 
> This allows you to make your own "release" of your own local eLearning
> platform that pulls in improvements and enhancements from the
> community code and your own mods.
> 
> Again, it depends on your scope and timing of your development, but if
> you plan to be making many changes that need QA, I might suggest YET
> ANOTHER server for doing QA testing with teachers and
> students...separate from the work in development (which may not work
> at all at any moment) and the "rock solid" server that the bulk of
> classes would be using.
> 
> 
> Sean Keesler
> 130 Academy Street
> Manlius, NY 13104
> 315-682-0830
> sean.keesler at threecanoes.com
> 
> 
> On Sat, Jun 19, 2010 at 8:10 PM, Brandon Davie
> <brandondavie at mckeelacademy.com> wrote:
>> Hello :-)
>> 
>> We are looking into using Sakai for a group of K12 charter schools. A small
>> pilot test of stock Sakai 2.6 took off well last term, so we¹re looking at
>> setting up a full production environment of stock Sakai 2.6 with the
>> intention of customizing Sakai at the code level.
>> 
>> My question relates to the type of setup that would be best for this
>> scenario. Let¹s say we have one production server running Debian and another
>> development system running OS X, which would be where any code level,
>> branding, etc. changes would be made. Is such a setup feasible? The ultimate
>> goal is to be able to develop and build Sakai on a separate machine from the
>> production server.
>> 
>> Production Server:
>> - Debian 5.0.4
>> - Java 1.5 U22
>> - Tomcat 5.5.29
>> 
>> Development System:
>> - OS X
>> - Java 1.5 U22
>> - Tomcat 5.5.29
>> - Maven 2.0.9
>> 
>> Using this setup, the latest maintenance branch could be pulled from the svn
>> repo to the development system, code level changes made, use Maven to build
>> and deploy to the dev system¹s Tomcat, changes tested and the resulting
>> $CATALINA_HOME dropped into the production server¹s Tomcat?
>> 
>> If you¹re wondering why these questions sound newbie, it¹s because they¹re
>> coming from one ;-)
>> 
>> Thanks!
>> Brandon Davie
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