Development Server Implementation

Question

Hello everyone!

I’m working on a side project with a friend. We currently develop code on a domain/server package purchased on hostmonster. During development I stumbled upon Digital Ocean and decided to give it a try. I created an Ubuntu Server droplet, pulled down a build from git, and the rest was history. I had the test site up and running in minutes! I was sold from that point on – I want to use Digital Ocean for all my web hosting needs. Creating a test site for our project was easy. I’m not really sure, however, what the best approach would be to creating a droplet to serve as a development server.

What is the best way to use a droplet as a development server? Should we develop code on our local machines, push the code to git, and then pull the development code down from git onto the development droplet?

kevinmarendedotcom · Answer

thank you for your comment on wordpress installation on localhost.

Moisey Uretsky · Answer

There’s no particular right or wrong way to do it, it all comes down to what’s comfortable.

One way that you can develop quickly and test without having to constantly deploy to the development server is to grant access to your DB from your local laptops/PCs and develop and test the code initially straight from your laptop, assuming it has the ability to run the stack you are developing in.

Then after you’ve done a days worth of work or a week you can deploy to the dev server and test from the web to ensure that everything works as expected from a proper linux server environment.

Using this method your development DB always stays in sync because even if you develop locally on your machine you are still connecting to the DB that is maintained on your development server. It also allows your friend to see the same DB state as you do when you guys are working.

alec · Answer

I’d definitely agree with Moisey on this one. Develop on your local environment then use the development server or ‘staging’ server to test to see how the code will run in a ‘production’ setting… compile assets, deploy from git and see how everything runs. If you need any more help, just drop me a line!

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Development Server Implementation

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Development Server Implementation