Our sample Laravel app

Machine setup with provided Vagrantfile:

1. Install Vagrant on your machine (http://vagrantup.com)

2. Run

    vagrant up
   

3. Access the vagrant image via:

    vagrant ssh
   

4. Install the dependencies for the sample application via

    cd /vagrant
    ./composer.phar install
    bundle install
   

Project setup:

1. Create the user & database

    createuser -Upostgres -hlocalhost -s vagrant
    createdb -Upostgres -hlocalhost laravel_sample_app_development
    createdb -Upostgres -hlocalhost laravel_sample_app_test
   

2. Install migrations

    php artisan migrate:install
    php artisan migrate:install --env=testing
   

3. Migrate and seed the database

    php artisan migrate --seed
    php artisan migrate --seed --env=testing
   

Start the application:

    php artisan server --host <eth0 IP address if youre using vagrant>

Console:

Laravel has a default console - tinker - but it's not very nice. Use boris instead:

    php artisan boris
    > User::all();

Testing

Test database

1. We have created a separate database laravel_sample_app_test for which all tests. Please don't use your development database for tests. We achieve this by creating an additional testing environment that can be accessed from artisan via the --env=testing flag.

Running all tests

We're using Codeception for our specifications. To run all the tests, execute:

	./codeception.phar run

You can specify a particular suite:

	./codeception.phar run unit

Debugging tests

1. In order to debug a test do refer to the setup step debugging of this documentation.

Acceptance tests

1. Acceptance tests drive the Firefox browser on the host machine, they have been setup for that. To start acceptance tests, firstly run the selenium server on the host machine, the provision script would of downloaded it into the scripts folder.

   user@host-machine $ java -jar scripts/selenium-server-standalone-2.35.0.jar
   

2. On vagrant, run your app in the test environment on port 3444

    vagrant@vagrant-ubuntu-raring-64:/vagrant$ php artisan server --host 10.0.2.15 --port 3444
   

3. On vagrant, start the acceptance tests

    vagrant@vagrant-ubuntu-raring-64:/vagrant$ ./vendor/bin/codecept run acceptance
   

Feature tests

1. Feature specs will be like acceptance but without going through an actual server (like using Rack driver for capybara). This is how codeception does things, so best we just follow

Unit tests

Factories

• woodlings... you need one of these before generating

Mocking

Javascript

CI

Step debugging

Overview

We have created a screencast to help with getting started with step debugging.

There are different parts to setting up step debugging for PHP. We will need to

• Make sure xdebug is setup on vagrant and working properly
• Setup a browser extension that will help signalling to xdebug that the debugger session should be started
• Have an xdebug-client that will be able to speak to xdebug session

Xdebug setup on Vagrant box

1. The Vagrant provision script would of setup our xdebug for remote debugging in our ubuntu box.

Install xdebug helper for Chrome

1. Xdebug only enables itself when it receives the right flag in a request.

2. To easily enable and disable debugging, install Xdebug helper

3. When you enable debugging, the server will break rightaway and try to connect to your xdebug client, so only turn it on if you actually want to debug.

Install an xdebug client

Installing MacGDBp

1. Install from its homepage
2. Set break points from within the code by making a call to xdebug_break()

Installing Vdebug plugin for Vim

1. Install Vdebug for remote debugging on your hostbox Vim instance. Copy the following into your plugin_config.vim. Change "/Users/mohan/Projects/laravel_sample_app" to where the root of project is on your machine, restart your vim and run :BundleInstall (This uses vundle, if you're using neo vim-config you're fine)

    Bundle 'joonty/vdebug.git'
      let g:vdebug_options= {
                \    "port" : 9000,
                \    "server" : 'localhost',
                \    "timeout" : 20,
                \    "on_close" : 'detach',
                \    "break_on_open" : 0,
                \    "continuous_mode" : 0,
                \    "ide_key" : '',
                \    "path_maps" : {'/vagrant' : '/Users/mohan/Projects/laravel_sample_app'},
                \    "debug_window_level" : 0,
                \    "debug_file_level" : 1,
                \    "debug_file" : "/tmp/vdebug.log",
                \    "watch_window_style" : 'expanded',
                \    "marker_default" : '⬦',
                \    "marker_closed_tree" : '▸',
                \    "marker_open_tree" : '▾'
                \}
   

2. I'll write a longer HOWTO use guide. For now though the plugin docs are pretty well written.

Asset organization

1. We use Basset for asset compilation.
2. There's a configuration file in app/config/packages/jasonlewis/basset/config.php that specifies the directories it'll compile.
3. To add new scss or coffescript files to the project, put them in app/public/stylesheets/ and app/public/assets/javascripts/ respectively.

Dependencies

1. Add new dependencies to composer.json and then run ./composer.phar update

2. (optional) Add any new dependencies and vendor at the same time

    ./composer.phar require davejamesmiller/laravel-boris dev-master
   

Using the generator to build scaffolds

Laravel ORM associations

Setting up a fresh project from scratch (on MacOSX)

1. Install phpenv - https://github.com/phpenv/phpenv

   • You may need to brew install bison gd. If so, you will need to link it brew link bison --force because it overwrites the system install.

   • Compile php with Postgres support. Modify ./phpenv/etc/php.#.#.PLATFORM.source to include:

       --with-pgsql=/usr/local/bin/pg_config
       --with-pdo-pgsql=/usr/local/bin/pg_config
     

2. Install composer curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php

3. Create a new Laravel project ./composer.phar create-project laravel/laravel PROJECT_NAME --prefer-dist

OR

You can run off of edge by simply cloning https://github.com/laravel/laravel/ and creating a master branch.