CodeIgniter on OpenShift

This QuickStart was created to make it easy to get started with CodeIgniter 2 on OpenShift.

CodeIgniter is a powerful PHP framework with a very small footprint, built for developers who need a simple and elegant toolkit to create full-featured web applications. CodeIgniter 2.x is the legacy version of the framework. The current version (2.2.1) came out in January, 2015.

The simplest way to install this application is to use the OpenShift QuickStart. If you'd like to install it manually, follow these directions.

OpenShift Considerations

These are some special considerations you may need to keep in mind when running your application on OpenShift using this QuickStart.

.htaccess Configuration

The .htaccess file has been pre-configured to remove trailing slashes and index.php from URLs (based on typical CodeIgniter best-practices).

Handling Assets (CSS, fonts, images, and JavaScript)

Deciding where to store your asset files isn't clear with CodeIgniter. Accordingly, this QuickStart is pre-configured with an assets directory for you to store your custom fonts, images, javascripts, and stylesheets.

We've also extended the base HTML and URL helper files to make using assets stored in the assets directories easy.

URL Helper

The URL Helper file contains functions that assist in working with URLs.

ADDED Asset URL - returns the URL of your assets directory. Example:

echo asset_url();
// http://example.com/assets/

Or, with a URI:

echo asset_url('images/logo.png'); 
// http://example.com/assets/images/logo.png

HTML Helper

The HTML Helper file contains functions that assist in working with HTML.

UPDATED Img - Lets you create HTML tags. Updated to automatically prepend 'assets/images/' to path when necessary. Example:

echo img('picture.jpg');
// <img src="http://example.com/assets/images/picture.jpg" />

UPDATED Link Tag - Lets you create HTML tags (mostly for stylesheets). Updated to automatically prepend 'assets/stylesheets/' to path when necessary and rel="stylesheet". Example:

echo link_tag('styles.css');
// <link src="http://example.com/assets/stylesheets/styles.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />

ADDED Script Tag - Lets you create HTML <script /> tags. Automatically prepends 'assets/javascripts/' to path when necessary. Example:

echo script_tag('jquery.js');
// <script type="text/javascript" src="http://example.com/assets/javascripts/jquery.js"></script>

Local vs. Remote Development

This CodeIgniter QuickStart provides separate configuration files for both local and remote development, found in application/config/local and application/config respectively.

Local Development

When developing locally, this QuickStart will set the CodeIngiter ENVIRONMENT to 'local' development mode.

Configuration files for working locally can be found at application/config/local. See the CodeIngiter user guide for more information on how CodeIgniter handles Multiple Environments.

Remote Development

Your application is configured to automatically use your OpenShift MySQL or PostgreSQL database in when deployed on OpenShift by making use of OpenShift Environment Variables.

The CodeIgniter base_url and encryption_key have also been configured to automatically draw from OpenShift Environment variables.

OpenShift provides a directory for data that requires persistent storage. Accordingly, the CodeIgniter cache_path, database cachedir, and session_save_path have been set to use this directory for storage.

Finally, the CodeIgniter ENVIRONMENT will be set automatically in production on OpenShift to match the value of the APPLICATION_ENV OpenShift Environment variable, set to 'production' by default.

Development Mode

When you develop your CodeIgniter application on OpenShift, you can also enable the 'development' environment by setting the APPLICATION_ENV environment variable using the rhc client, like:

$ rhc env set APPLICATION_ENV=development -a <app-name>

Then, restart your application:

$ rhc app restart -a <app-name>

If you do so, OpenShift will run your application under 'development' mode. In development mode, your application will:

• Set CodeIgniter's ENVIRONMENT to 'development'
• Show more detailed errors in browser
• Display startup errors
• Enable the Xdebug PECL extension
• Enable APC stat check
• Ignore your composer.lock file

Set the variable to 'production' and restart your app to deactivate error reporting and resume production PHP settings.

Using the development environment can help you debug problems in your application in the same way as you do when developing on your local machine. However, we strongly advise you not to run your application in this mode in production.

Log Files

Your application is configured to use the OpenShift log directory. You can use the rhc tail command to stream the latest log file entries:

rhc tail -a <APP_NAME>

To stop tailing the logs, press Ctrl + c.

Manual Installation

1. Create an account at https://www.openshift.com/

2. Create a CodeIgniter application:

   rhc app create codeigniterapp php-5.4 mysql-5.5 --from-code=https://github.com/openshift/CodeIgniterQuickStart
   

   or

   rhc app create codeigniterapp php-5.4 postgresql-9.2 --from-code=https://github.com/openshift/CodeIgniterQuickStart
   

Additional Resources

Documentation for the CodeIgniter framework can be found on the CodeIgniter website. Check out OpenShift's Developer Portal for help running PHP on OpenShift.