HOW TO: Run a Symfony Application

Gaudi just requires a configuration file in order to run an architecture. As there is never enough documentation and/or tutorials, this is a full example of how to build and run a Symfony project that can display a username from the database.

To run a Symfony app, we need an Apache server, a PHP-FPM app and a MySQL database.

Create the Configuration File

Create a .gaudi.yml file in a new folder:

applications:
    front:
        type: apache
        links: [app]
        ports:
            80: 80
        volumes:
            .: /var/www
        custom:
            fastCgi: app
            documentRoot: /var/www/web
            modules: [rewrite]

    app:
        type: php-fpm
        links: [db]
        ports:
            9000: 9000
        volumes:
            .: /var/www

    db:
        type: mysql
        ports:
            3306: 3306
        after_script: mysql -e "CREATE DATABASE symfony CHARACTER SET utf8 COLLATE utf8_general_ci;" -uroot
        volumes:
            .gaudi/mysql: /var/lib/mysql

It defines 3 applications.

Front

This application is the Apache server. It redirects all PHP requests to the PHP-FPM application.

The volumes option mounts a folder of the host machine in the container: we mount the current folder (.) in /var/www.

The custom option defines the specific configuration of an application.

• Activate fastcgi to indicate which application will receive the fastcgi requests.
• Specify document root into the web folder (default configuration for a Symfony application)
• Enable the mod_rewrite module for Apache

Link the application to the PHP-FPM one called app.

PHP-FPM

The PHP-FPM app also mount the current folder to /var/www. This tells PHP which file to process.

It is linked to the db application.

MySQL

The MySQL application store all its data into the /var/lib/mysql by default.

As Docker does not keep data when a container is removed, we need to mount a folder from the host machine into /var/lib/mysql.

The after_script runs the script after the launch of MySQL: In this example, create a new database.

Starting the Architecture

To start the Symfony app, run in the current folder:

$ mkdir -p .gaudi/mysql
$ gaudi

Cleaning front ...
Cleaning app ...
Cleaning db ...
Building gaudi/front ...
Building gaudi/app ...
Building gaudi/db ...
Starting db ...
Application db started (172.17.0.153:3306)
Starting app ...
Application app started (172.17.0.154:9000)
Starting front ...
Application front started (172.17.0.155:80)

The building process can take a few minutes the first time. Thereafter Docker will detect the differences between the last build and run only what needed.

The 3 applications are now started: we can attach the app application to install Symfony.

Install Symfony

To run some php commands in the PHP-FPM application, use the docker attach command.

$ docker attach app   # the PHP-FPM application is called `app` in the configuration file
$ cd /var/www
$ # Symfony is first created in a symfony folder because we need an empty folder to run composer
$ composer -n create-project symfony/framework-standard-edition symfony 2.4.1 && mv symfony . && rm -rf symfony

Configure Symfony

Retrieve The Database IP

Create the app/config/parameters.php file to retrieve the db host in the Symfony configuration :

$container->setParameter('database_host', getenv('DB_PORT_3306_TCP_ADDR'));

Change the app/config/config.yml to include this new file after the inclusion of parameters.yml :

imports:
	# ...
    - { resource: parameters.php }

Creating the Database

Create a new entity in src/Acme/DemoBundle/Entity/User.php :

<?php

namespace Acme\DemoBundle\Entity;

use Doctrine\ORM\Mapping as ORM;

/**
 * @ORM\Table("user")
 * @ORM\Entity()
 */
class User
{
    /**
     * @var integer
     *
     * @ORM\Column(name="id", type="integer")
     * @ORM\Id
     * @ORM\GeneratedValue(strategy="AUTO")
     */
    private $id;

    /**
     * @var string
     *
     * @ORM\Column(name="username", type="string", length=255)
     */
    private $username;

    /**
     * @param string $username
     */
    public function __construct($username = null)
    {
        $this->username = $username;
    }

    /**
     * @return integer
     */
    public function getId()
    {
        return $this->id;
    }

    /**
     * @return string
     */
    public function getUserName()
    {
        return $this->username;
    }
}

Create the database :

$ php app/console doctrine:schema:update --force
Updating database schema...
Database schema updated successfully! "1" queries were executed

Detach the app with ctrl+p ctrl+q.

Populating the Database

To retrieve the db IP, simply run :

$ gaudi --check

Application front is running (172.17.0.155:80)
Application app is running (172.17.0.154:9000)
Application db is running (172.17.0.153:3306)

Create a new user in the database :

$ mysql -h 172.17.0.153
$ INSERT INTO symfony.user (username) VALUES ('Manu');

Retrieve User From the Database

To check if Symfony can retrieve this user, add in the src/Acme/DemoBunde/Controller/DemoController.php :

$user = $this->get('doctrine.orm.entity_manager')->getRepository('AcmeDemoBundle:User')->find(1);
var_dump($user->getUsername());