Snap Wagon

Installation

Project Directory

Create a project directory for Snap Wagon on your local machine. This is the structure I use:

Projects
└── snapwagon.io
    ├── media
    ├── source
    ├── static
    └── venv

The media and static directories hold all static asset files. User-created files are uploaded to media and assets created by our team live in static. All of the code lives in source. The virtual environment is housed in venv. We'll go into each of these directories more in depth in subsequent sections.

Source

Clone the repository from GitHub using the following command. If you are using my directory structure, then clone the files in source.

$ git clone [email protected]:snapwagon/snapwagon.git

Python

Snap Wagon requires Python 3. Install it with Homebrew by running the following command in your terminal:

$ brew install python3

Virtual Environment

Install virtualenv to create virtual environments for Python. Create a new virtual environment for Snap Wagon. Make sure you change directories into venv first.

$ cd ~/Projects/snapwagon.io/venv
$ pip3 install virtualenv
$ virtualenv -p /usr/local/bin/python3 .
$ source ./bin/activate

Next, navigate to the source directory and run the following command to install all of the project dependencies. Your terminal should indicate that your virtual environment (venv) is activated.

(venv) $ pip install -r requirements/local.txt

Environment Variables

Snap Wagon requires some environment variables to be configured in order to run the server. These variables include database credentials and API keys to Sparkpost and Stripe. Enable these environment variables by executing the following command from the source directory.

(venv) $ source .env

Database

Snap Wagon uses a PostgreSQL database. Install it with Homebrew and then run the psql client.

(venv) $ brew install postgresql
(venv) $ psql postgres
psql (9.6.3)
Type "help" for help.

postgres=#

Create a new username and a password and then quit psql. After you quit, you will be brought back to your normal terminal.

postgres=# CREATE ROLE username WITH LOGIN PASSWORD 'password';
postgres=# ALTER ROLE username CREATEDB;
postgres=# \q

Don't literally type the words username and password--replace them with a username and password of your choosing. Make sure the DATABASE_USER and DATABASE_PASS variables in your .env file match the PostgreSQL username and password you just chose. You will have to re-source your environment variables if you change them in your .env file.

Log back into psql with your new user and then create a new database for Snap Wagon.

(venv) $ psql postgres -U username
psql (9.6.3)
Type "help" for help.

postgres=# CREATE DATABASE snapwagon;
postgres=# GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON DATABASE snapwagon TO username;
postgres=# \connect snapwagon
snapwagon=#

Make sure all of your DATABASE_ environment variables match up to the values you chose one last time.

Django

Now that the database exists, migrate the schema configured in Django.

(venv) $ python manage.py migrate --settings=settings.local

If you run export DJANGO_SETTINGS_MODULE=settings.local in your terminal, you can omit the --settings argument when running manage.py.

After you migrate your database schema, create a Django superuser. Superusers have access to the admin portal.

(venv) $ python manage.py createsuperuser

As a final step, collect Snap Wagon's static files into the static directory. If you copied my directory structure, then the settings file is already configured to point to the right location. Then, run your Django server. With the server running, you should be able to visit Snap Wagon in your browser at http://localhost:8000 and the Django admin at http://localhost:8000/admin/.

(venv) $ python manage.py collectstatic
(venv) $ python manage.py runserver 0.0.0.0:8000

One last thing. Execute the following code to run the server tests. Make sure your current directory is /source/snapwagon/.

(venv) $ python runtests.py