Deploying Wordpress on Dotcloud

First, get a copy of all the files of this package in the root of your Wordpress directory:

cd wordpress
git clone https://github.com/qpleple/wordpress-on-dotcloud
mv wordpress-on-dotcloud/* .
chmod +x postinstall

Then push to Dotcloud:

dotcloud create myblog
dotcloud push myblog
dotcloud push myblog # dotcloud issue: database not ready at first push

Note that after the first push, remote wp-content/ will not be overwritten by a new push:

• uploaded static files will be kept
• new local plugins and themes will be pushed remotely
• modifications to existing plugins and themes will be ignored remotely

Under the hood

The package contains:

1. The dotcloud.yml required to push to Dotcloud declaring 2 services:

    www:
        type: php
    db:
        type: mysql
   

2. The nginx.conf file telling Nginx to redirect everything to Wordpress front controller as Dotcloud does not support .htaccess files (included in Wordpress):

    try_files $uri $uri/ /index.php;
   

3. The postinstall script that is a post-install hook and will be executed by Dotcloud after each push. It is calling the scripts in the dotcloud-scripts/ directory:

    # Reads environment.json and config MySQL values in wp-config.php
    ./dotcloud-scripts/feed-wp-config.php
    
    # Move wp-content to make it persistent
    ./dotcloud-scripts/persist-wp-content.sh
   

4. The feed-wp-config.php script (executed by the post-install hook) that gets the parameters of the just created MySQL Dotcloud service, write them into the wp-config.php file and create the database if it does not exist. If wp-config.php does not exist, it will create it from wp-config-sample.php.

    if [ -d ~/data/wp-content ]; then
        mv -n ~/current/wp-content/plugins/* ~/data/wp-content/plugins
        mv -n ~/current/wp-content/themes/* ~/data/wp-content/themes
        rm -rf ~/current/wp-content
    else
        mkdir -p ~/data/wp-content
        mv ~/current/wp-content ~/data
    fi
   
    ln -s ~/data/wp-content ~/current/wp-content
   

5. The persist-wp-content.sh script (executed by the post-install hook) that persists the wp-content/ directory containing uploads, installed plugins and themes. It moves the directory from ~/code/wp-content it to ~/data/wp-content and makes a symlink to it, because ~/code will be overwritten at each push.

More about themes and plugins updates

If it is not the first push, the persist-wp-content.sh executes:

mv -n ~/current/wp-content/plugins/* ~/data/wp-content/plugins
mv -n ~/current/wp-content/themes/* ~/data/wp-content/themes

The -n option means: do not overwrite an existing file. It means that plugins added in the local Wordpress will be added remotely. But if the remote Wordpress has already a plugin/theme, the local version of this plugin/theme will be ignored during the push (even if it has been modified on the local Wordpress).