How to Automate Local App Setup Process Using Bin/Setup

Sep 5, 2016 • 3 min read

Recently, I have done some research on creating an interactive bin/setup script that can lead a developer who joined a new project through app's local setup process.

The new bin/setup script was supposed to create a sec_config.yml file from a sample while asking a developer to provide necessary missing values and saving them to the new file.

The script I created is a sample one with a possibility to change it when needed. I created support for standard sec_config/secrets files in yaml format and for standard .env file format.

The script is divided into a few sections.

Section #1

[code]

Here you'd want to add commands that install/update gems, install required ruby version, npm/bower dependencies, etc.

Section #2

[code]

This section is responsible for all config files logic.

In the first block, you can create database.yml from the sample file. If the database.yml.sample file has two keys: username and password, you can replace them as shown above.

You can also replace the code with gsub_file method:

[code]

In this block, you can create a new config file from the sample or edit the existing one (if it's present). You need to set the config path in CONFIG_FILE constant. Script will ask the user to provide required values (keys are present in the sample file, but they have no value).

[code]

For this sec_config.yml.sample file, the script will work like this:

[code]

...which results in the following sec_config.yml:

[code]

The block above is for creating a standard .env file from this sample:

[code]

This will ask the user for values that are missing. You need to get value for each key that is present and has no value in the sample file.

Section #3

[code]

This section is taking care of the database setup. You can just use bin/rake db:setup here or add additional commands like bin/rake db:test:prepare. Of course, you can add beautiful and colourful messages as shown in the example.