Deploy with git

Our first deployment task is simple: we need to get our code to the server! By default, Ansistrano does that via rsync... but it has a bunch of options! Check out the ansistrano_deploy_via variable. Beyond rsync, you can use copy, git, svn, s3 - if you want to fetch your code from an S3 bucket - and download. We're going to use the git strategy! And most of the rest of the variables in the docs are specific to your deploy strategy.

Setting up the git Repo

Ok, so we're going to deploy via git... which means... well, we should probably create a git repository! First, I'll commit everything locally. You may even need to initialize your git repository with git init. I already have a repo, so I'll just commit:

git add .
git commit -m "I'm king of the world!"

Perfect! Next, we need to host our Git repository somewhere. It doesn't matter where, but I'll use GitHub. Create a brand new repository! Woo! I'm making this public, but we will talk soon about how to deploy private repositories.

Copy the 2 lines to add the remote and push our code. Then, in your terminal, paste them:

git remote add origin git@github.com:weaverryan/ansistrano-deploy.git git push -u origin master

Progress!

Back on GitHub, refresh! There is our beautiful code!

Configuring the Deploy

Back in Ansistrano land, the first thing we need to do is configure that ansistrano_deploy_via variable. Set it to git:

For the Git-specific variables, we need to configure two: the URL to the repo and what branch to deploy. Copy ansistrano_git_repo first and paste it. For the URL, go back to GitHub and click on "Clone or download". For now, use the https version of the URL. We're going to change this in a few minutes - but this makes life simpler to start:

Now copy the last variable: ansistrano_git_branch. We don't really need to set this... because it defaults to master. But let's set it anyways:

Moment of truth! Go back to your terminal and run the playbook again:

ansible-playbook -i ansible/hosts.ini ansible/deploy.yml

This time, we see some Git-related tasks. So that's probably good! And it finishes without any errors.

Let's go see what it did! I'll move back to my terminal that's SSH'ed onto the server. Move out of the current/ directory. That's important: the current symlink did change, but until you move out of it, you're still looking at the old release directory.

Ok cool! There are two things in releases/, and the symlink points to the new one. Move back into current/. And... there's our project! Our code is deployed! Yea, we are missing some things, like parameters.yml, but we'll get there. For now, celebrate!