Description

Configures a server for rails hosting. Delegates as much as possible to other cookbooks & ties everything together.

Attributes

app_dir location on remote system where rails project will be found. Defaults to "/vagrant".

Installation

I suggest installing through librarian-chef. Librarian manages chef recipes analogous to how bundler managers gems. So first install librarian:

# Install librarian
gem install librarian

# Add its work directories to your gitignore
echo cookbooks >> .gitignore
echo tmp >> .gitignore

# Create the Librarian config file
librarian-chef init

# Create a spot for vendored cookbooks
mkdir cookbooks-src

# Clone rails-lastmile into vendored cookbooks
git submodule add git://github.com/DanThiffault/rails-lastmile.git cookbooks-src/rails-lastmile

Next setup your Cheffile (think Gemfile) with the following recipes

cookbook 'build-essential'

cookbook 'ruby_build',
  :git => 'git://github.com/fnichol/chef-ruby_build.git', :ref => 'v0.6.2'
cookbook 'rbenv',
  :git => 'https://github.com/fnichol/chef-rbenv', :ref => '7d9b66f20d6edb786720b22919fd53e698fce12b'
cookbook 'apt',
  :git => 'https://github.com/opscode-cookbooks/apt'
cookbook 'unicorn'
cookbook  'nginx'
cookbook  'runit'

Any time you make changes to your Cheffile be sure to run

librarian-chef install

Note that you can customize rails-last mile (or any other cookbook you put into cookbooks-src). If you make changes to cookbooks managed by librarian they will be overwritten.

Usage

The goal of rails-lastmile is to make deployments to different environments as similar as possible. Check the subsections below for how to deploy to a particular environment.

Vagrant

Vagrant is the first environment rails-lastmile supports. Firstly you need to install and setup Vagrant in this project. Make sure to install the lastest virtual box from here

# Install the gem
gem install vagrant

# Grab the 64-bit base box. This could take a while
vagrant box add precise64 http://files.vagrantup.com/precise64.box

# Make sure you're in the application directory and create a Vagrantfile
vagrant init precise64

In order to use with vagrant make a Vagrantfile something like this:

  config.vm.provision :chef_solo do |chef|
    chef.cookbooks_path = ["cookbooks","cookbooks-src"]

    chef.add_recipe "rails-lastmile"
    chef.json = {
      'rails-lastmile' => {
         'app_dir' => '/path/to/app',
         'ruby_version' => '1.9.3-p385',
         'nginx_ssl' => false
      },
      'unicorn' => {
        'worker_processes' => 1
      }
    }
  end

Don't forget that you need to have the unicorn gem in your Gemfile. Last thing to do is boot up the virtual machine. With the command vagrant up

This will take a while depending on your internet connection and computer speed. After the command completes you should have a fully deployed app on your vagrant box.

FAQ

Q. My cpu is pegged at 100% after deploying. Ensure that you have the following two lines in your Gemfile when deploying to a linux box:

   gem "execjs"
   gem "therubyracer"

Q. I want to enable SSl. How can I do that?

Ensure you have 'nginx_ssl' set to true in your json file: chef.json = { 'rails-lastmile' => { 'nginx_ssl' => true }

Then generate self signed certificates and put them into config/certs inside your app next the the Vagrantfile. Example instructions: http://www.akadia.com/services/ssh_test_certificate.html