Running the app

This application can be run stand-alone as a rails server in development mode. However, when deployed, applications will run behind a reverse proxy.

This enables request to be routed to the appropriate application base on the request path. In order to simplifiy the proxy configuration we retain the original path where possible.

For information on how to running a proxy to mimic production and run multple services together read through the information in our simple-web-proxy repository.

If running more than one application locally ensure that each is listerning on a separate port and separate path. In the case of running local docker images, the required configuration is captured in the Makefile.

Locally

For developing rails applications you can start the server locally using the following command:

rails server

and visit localhost:3000 in your browser.

To change to using production mode use the -e option; or to change to a different port use the -p option.

Note: In production mode, SECRET_KEY_BASE is also required. It is insufficient to just set this as the value must be exported. e.g.

export SECRET_KEY_BASE=$(./bin/rails secret)

Running Rails as a server with a sub-directory via Makefile

API_SERVICE_URL=<data-api url> RAILS_ENV=<mode> RAILS_RELATIVE_URL_ROOT=/<path> make server

The default for RAILS_ENV here is development.

As a docker container

It can be useful to run the compiled Docker image, that will mirror the production installation, locally yourself. Assuming you have the Standard Reports Manager running, then you can run the Docker image for the app itself as follows:

make image run

or, if the image is already built, simply

make run

Docker images run in production mode.

To test the running application visit localhost:<port>/<application path>.

Development and Production mode

Applications running in development mode default to not use a sub-directory to aid stand-alone development.

Applications running in production mode do use a sub-directory i.e. /app/standard-reports.

In each case the is achieved by setting config.relative_url_root property to this sub-directory within the file config/environments/(development|production).rb.

If need be, config.relative_url_root may by overridden by means of the RAILS_RELATIVE_URL_ROOT environment variable, althought this could also require rebuilding the assets or docker image.