Greetings Shifters!
I am proud to announce that Katie Miller and I have released a book – Getting Started with OpenShift: A Guide for Impatient Beginners. This book had three sources of inspiration:
- I’ve always been a fan of the “Busy Developers’ Guide to HSSF and XSSF Features” — it provided just the stuff I needed to get started, with more to read later if I wanted to.
- There were a lot of questions in the OpenShift forums and on IRC like:
I keep getting permission denied for my SSH key…what’s wrong?
How do I add a library to my Python application?
How do I connect to my MySQL database from my laptop?
- We taught many intro workshops for developers where lots of these questions were asked and answered.
Then we thought, “Why not condense down the workshops into an essential guide for those getting started? Just the stuff you need–not a whole reference manual or an in-depth discussion of every topic.”
And so we wrote the book and it’s ready for you today in three popular electronic formats: ePub, Kindle, and PDF. We’re also giving out physical books at some events so come on out.
So without further ado, here is the book. The table of contents gives a great idea of what’s covered in the book.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
What Is the Difference Between IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS?
The Three Versions of OpenShift
Choosing the Right Solution for You
Things to Understand
Words You Need to Understand
Technology You Need to Understand
2. Creating Applications
Preliminary Steps
Setting Up the Command-Line Tools
Creating Your First Application
Autoscaling and Why You Should Use It by Default
Reasons to Move to the Paid Tier
3. Making Code Modifications
Cloning Code to Your Local Machine
Modifying Application Code
Building and Deploying Your Code
Action Hook Scripts
Hot-Deploying Code
4. Adding Application Components
Database-Related Cartridges
Nondatabase Cartridges
Cron
Continuous Integration
Metrics and Monitoring
Finding Cartridges and QuickStarts
Adding Third-Party Cartridges
5. Environment and Application Management
SSH Access
Using SSH to Interact with a Database
Importing SQL in an SSH Session
Environment Variables
Preconfigured Environment Variables
Custom Environment Variables
Overriding Preconfigured Environment Variables
Log Access
Changing Application Server or Database Settings
Application Server Configuration Changes
Database Configuration Changes
Using Marker Files
6. Library Dependencies
Where to Declare Dependencies
Incorporating Your Own Binary Dependencies
Modifying Your Application to Use the Database
Code to Connect to the Database
Code to Close the Database Connection
Code to Query the Terms for the Insult
What We Have Gained by Adding a Database
7. Networking
WebSockets
SSH Port Forwarding
Custom URLs
SSL Certificates
Talking to Other Services
Addressable Ports
8. Disk Usage
Where You Can Write “to Disk”
Determining How Much Disk Space Is Used
Copying Files to or from Your Local Machine
Other Storage Options
9. Backup
Managing Deployments and Rollbacks
Manual Deployments
Keeping and Utilizing Deployment History
Application Snapshots with RHC
Backing Up Your Database
Writing a Cron Script
Moving Data off the Gear
10. Team Collaboration
Managing Multiple SSH Keys
Domain Access for Teams
Possible Workflows
11. Summary
What We Covered
Other Areas to Explore
Final Words
Appendix A. Basic Linux for Non-Linux Users
The book is available for download in a variety of formats (ePub, Kindle, and PDF) so have a read and tell us what you think. We would love feedback and even better, we would love you to get started with OpenShift. We hope this book starts you on a journey to many exciting applications.
Need an OpenShift account to try out the examples in the book? All you need is an email address and password. You’ll be started in no time.