Local DEV

Run Automail locally on your laptop.

Local Automail instances run on a development server that comes with Automail.

The recommended local database is MySQL. If not yet installed on your laptop, download the MySQL Community Server and MySQL Workbench MSI installers from the official MySQL website and proceed with the installation.

For MacOS, you can install the local MySQL server by running brew install mysql.

1. Clone the forked repository locally within your Lineverge/Automail Forks folder.

git clone https://github.com/Lineverge/[forked repo name].git

2. Create a local MySQL database by using an SQL editor in MySQL workbench.

CREATE SCHEMA `[forked repo name]` DEFAULT CHARACTER SET utf8mb4 COLLATE utf8mb4_bin ;
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
CREATE USER 'automail'@'localhost' IDENTIFIED BY 'Test12345'; -- If user automail does not yet exist
FLUSH PRIVILEGES;
GRANT ALL ON [forked repo name].* TO 'automail'@'localhost';

3. Create and activate a new Python virtual environment automail dedicated to your instance and outside of your repository.

cd C:\Users\user\Documents\Lineverge\Virtual Environments
virtualenv automail
automail\Scripts\activate

4. Navigate to the repository root folder and install the requirements.

cd C:\Users\user\Documents\Lineverge\Automail Forks\[forked repo name]
pip install -r software\requirements.txt

5. Add the client logo into the folder software\project\static\images\company\logo.png with the dimensions 320x320.

6. Navigate C:\Users\user\Documents\Lineverge\Automail Forks\[forked repo name]\software\project and create your settings.py file following the instructions.

7. Migrate the initial data model and then run the local test server to confirm the installation was successful.

python software\project\automail.py migrate
python software\project\automail.py runserver

All your instance-specific configurations must be within the software\project folder. Any changes outside the project folder will be overwritten the next time the fork gets synced with the Automail main repository.

Local changes within the project folder should be first tested extensively locally and then versioned with comprehensive comments using Git.

Example:

git add .
git commit -am "adding piechart to show order quantity grouped by brands"
git push

In the case of a containerized PROD, every push to the main branch will automatically deploy the committed local changes to the production site.