This repository helps you easily run multiple parallel Dolibarr installations in different versions. Easy Dolibarr installation is a separate unit for it self complete with it's own mariadb database, Dolibarr and a phpmyadmin for a much better view of the database.
podman containers and especially podman pods are used to keep separate things separate, but also at the same time keep tightly coupled containers inside a single unit.
Since the aim of this repository is to make Dolibarr development more easy, we need to easily have the container use the git repository that you make your changes in, so easy that it is basically just a browser reload, and then you are directly viewing the result of your code changes. There are multiple solutions to this, but git worktree is the best. You can start reading about git worktree here: https://www.hatica.io/blog/git-worktree/ https://www.gitkraken.com/learn/git/git-worktree https://git-scm.com/docs/git-worktree
A unit is meant as a stand on it's own working Dolibarr solution. It is kept inside a podman pod which you can read much more about here: https://www.redhat.com/en/topics/containers/what-is-podman#what-are-pods
There bare minimum for a working Dolibarr installation is of course Dolibarr, but you also need a database, here we have decided on using the latest mariadb container image because it is free both in speech and beer. The same applies to Dolibarr.
To make database access much much easier this setup also allows to run a phpmyadmin container inside the same unit. You don't need this, so the default is not to start the phpmyadmin container.
To facilitate running other containers inside the same pod, this might use the Dolibarr API, or integration with other stuff. Therefore each podman pod is defined with a range of ports to be forwarded inside the pod, but not all of them are used by default:
- xxx36 is used for accessing phpmyadmin
- xxx80 is used for accessing Dolibarr
- xxx81-89 is forwarded but not used by default, you may use this for your own stuff. Another use for ports 81-89 is for running a stock dolibarr at port 80 and then your own branch at ports 81-89 if you are working on the GUI and want to easily switch back and forth comparing stock and your new development. But you could also just run it as a separate unit.
The xxx is dependent on which version of Dolibarr you want to run:
- development has xxx = 80 so ports become 8036, 8080 and so on
- Dolibarr version 21.0 has xxx = 210
- version 20 has xxx = 200
- and so on
Naming is used to make it easy to correlate pods, containers, the port numbers and the dolibarr version.
podman pod supports many names, but to make it easier to correlate, remember and control the pod names will be dolipod_${VERSION}.
Podman containers may also have many different names, but once again the naming choice for a given version
- mariadb_${VERSION}
- dolibarr_${VERSION}
- phpmyadmin_${VERSION}
To bring it all together we need some code and some data - let's start with the data.
To ensure we start with the same data in all containers, you simply take your backup from your production Dolibarr and initialize the mariadb from that backup. This is done by mounting the backup file to this location in the mariadb container /docker-entrypoint-initdb.d/${FILENAME}
Given that each git worktree is stored in a separate folder, and that each git worktree folder can have it's own branch, then we simply mount the htdocs/ subfolder from that git worktree folder to /var/www/html inside the Dolibarr container running the corresponding version to the branch in git.
For security reasons we aim for using random passwords, but to make it easy to share these passwords between the multiple containers that needs to know them, we will use podman secrets which you can read more about here: https://www.redhat.com/en/blog/new-podman-secrets-command
IF you use this setup as a basis for any kind of production, then you need to store these passwords in a separate password manager.
If you need to know the passwords, simply enter into the mariadb container and type export because that will reveal both the mariadb root password also used by the phpmyadmin container and the doliuser password used by mariadb and dolibarr.
- Clone this repo
- copy default.config to local.config and make the necessary changes
- run ./first_setup_git_repo_and_worktree.sh
- run ./second_create_podman_setup.sh
- run ./third_start_podman_setup.sh
- direct your browser to each dolibarr installation that you configured in ${ACTIVE_VERSIONS}
Here's some recomendations for using podman containers.
Download it from https://podman-desktop.io
make some aliases in bash for easy container mangement
Execute a command inside a name container alias: penter='podman exec -it' usage: penter dolibarr_21.0 bash
Same as penter, you just become root alias: punter='podman exec -itu 0' usage: punter mariadb_20.0 bash
View the logs of a container, because most apps inside a container just sends logging to stdout alias: plogs="podman logs" alias: plogsf="podman logs -f" usage: plogs dolibarr_20.0