Setting up Q2A via a Dokku instance

Setting up Dokku

1. Install vagrant to run Debian in a VM
2. Bootstrap Dokku

   wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dokku/dokku/v0.21.4/bootstrap.sh
   sudo DOKKU_TAG=v0.21.4 bash bootstrap.sh
       

3. Web setup
   • Add ssh key for admin access
   • Name remote
4. Install heroku-buildpack-php Probably unnecessary (default, or already installed)

   dokku buildpacks:add php https://github.com/heroku/heroku-buildpack-php.git
       

5. Install dokku-mysql Probably unnecessary (already installed)

   sudo dokku plugin:install https://github.com/dokku/dokku-mysql.git
       

Prepare containers for Q2A

Q2A

dokku apps:create q2a

# Define port, mapping from external to internal
# Using 80 as an example
dokku proxy:ports-add q2a http:80:5000

MySQL database

Initialised with mysql, but also works with mariadb and others.

dokku mysql:create q2a
dokku mysql:link q2a q2a

# Obtain auth-info
dokku mysql:info q2a --dsn
# Retrieve password from output, e.g. `mysql://mysql:$PASSWORD@dokku-mysql-q2a:3306/q2a`

# Replace $PASSWORD with the retrieved value
dokku config:set q2a DATABASE_PASSWORD='$PASSWORD'

Install Question2Answer

1. Download the latest release
2. Unzip in a folder
3. Init git repo
4. Init composer.json, required for dokku containers

   echo '{}' > composer.json
       

5. Init qa-config.php

   mv qa-config-example.php qa-config.php
       

6. Modify qa-config.php with the database info obtained in the previous step:

   ...
        define('QA_MYSQL_HOSTNAME', 'dokku-mysql-q2a');
        define('QA_MYSQL_PORT', '3306');
        define('QA_MYSQL_USERNAME', 'mysql);
        define('QA_MYSQL_PASSWORD', getenv('DATABASE_PASSWORD'));
        define('QA_MYSQL_DATABASE', 'q2a');
   ...
       

   Note that QA_MYSQL_PASSWORD is retrieved from the app’s ENV (managed with dokku).

7. Add remote and push

   git remote add dokku@server:q2a
   git push dokku master
       

8. Configure via web-interface