Dev Server Configurations...

net-carver · 2007-02-16 23:56:02

Folks,

just looking for some advice regarding various server combinations to allow for more robust testing of my apps. I released the MLP Pack after testing on a few combinations of PHP and MySQL on Windows or Linux and user feedback is that it’s basically ok on the combinations that I tested on but there are problems occuring on combo’s that I’m not currently able to test. This is a bit problematic as I can’t yet reproduce some of the problems with a view to fixing them.

What I’d like to do now is expand the range of testing setups I have on my dev box so I can easily test on a wider range of server combinations than I have now. However, when you consider the combinatorial explosion that occurs when you look at the OS / PHP / Apache / module vs fast-cgi / MySQL variables this quickly becomes difficult to manage.

I’d be interested to hear how you manage your development test environments and what you exclude from your testing. In particular, I’m looking for an easy way to be able to test with PHP4 / PHP5 / MySQL 4.0 / MySQL 5.0 without having to reboot to select a new combo of PHP and MySQL.

Currently, I have PHP5 as an Apache2 module on port 80 and have PHP4 (again as an Apache2 module) on another port. I start this second instance of Apache only when I need it. This setup is very convenient as I can very quickly test pages in PHP4 or 5 just by tacking a port number onto my intranet URL. I’d like to be able to add another instance for fast-cgi on yet another port (or perhaps two — one for PHP4 and PHP5) but I have absolutely no experience of fast-cgi: is this even possible?

For MySQL I am only currently running MySQL 5.0.22 and therefore need to get a 4.0.x up and running too. Can I simply run multiple versions of the MySQL server (startup configured on different ports/sockets) to take care of testing against those versions and then write a script to update the /textpattern/config.php file to switch Txp back and forth between the default localhost to localhost:mysql_4_port as needed?

I am, at present, going to limit this to running these variable test configs only on Linux and stick with a fixed WAMP setup for Windows testing.

Many thanks in advance for your feedback!

marios · 2007-02-17 15:22:01

Hi , Steve

For getting FastCGI running together with a XAMPP package, take a look here
(Scroll down to the middle)

There are obviously many ways to deal with this, like Parallels and such.
Here is one option:
The point to me is mainly, that I want to have these things accessible throughout the network:

The public root Site Folders for each Site

The test domains for the front/backends on each workstation

httpd conf and phpadmin on at least one mashine

( So I can also test on any Browser )

This is the way I have been doing it:

My Site rootfolders root Folder is sitting on a network allocated Share

I then mount this Folder on all workstations and give it a drive letter

I then edit my hosts file and assign the IP of the NAS to each dev domain

I set up virtual hosts in httpd.conf for my dev domains (Send my an email, if you want examples)

I can now go ahead and install a XAMPP package ( or multiple instances therof) on any Drive on my dev server. (If I don’t install these as Services, I can run as much Server Cofigurations as I like, one instance each at a time, not simultanously , without changing port numbers for Apache and mySql).
Here it makes sense somehow, to use a common httpd conf file, for those configurations that allow it
( Havent’ looked into that yet)

For previous versions of PHP and mysql, I choose older packages at sourcforge

Some packages have a batchcommand, that let you switch forth and back between PHP5 and PHP4 ( Also convenient )

regards, marios

net-carver · 2007-02-18 03:02:39

Marios

thanks for the reply. There’s a lot of information tucked away in that lot!

I’m only really interested in working on the Linux side right now and am just started experimenting with using virtual machines in VMWare on Ubuntu. I intend putting Warty into a vm and use that to run and test in older MySQL configs (I believe it goes back to MySQL 4.0.x)

Regarding the port switching method I wrote about above: about the only downside I have found with this at the moment is the need to change one admin preference to keep things from defaulting back to port 80. This isn’t annoying at the moment but could become so later — so I may end up using scripts to do this all anyway and just switch in/out PHP servers on port 80.

Textpattern CMS

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#1 2007-02-16 23:56:02

Dev Server Configurations...

#2 2007-02-17 15:22:01

Re: Dev Server Configurations...

#3 2007-02-18 03:02:39

Re: Dev Server Configurations...

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