Ainsofs Blog: Technology insights from the Pacific Islands

Tugboat offers a straightforward way to create working versions of your website or app for each branch in your repository, making it easier to test and share features before merging them 🚀. In this blog, we'll explore how we set up Tugboat QA for a Laravel 10 project using Jetstream with Inertia.js and Vue 3. Along the way, we'll discuss the setup process, some unexpected challenges ⚙️, and our experiences navigating the quirks of this useful tool 🔧. Whether you're curious about Tugboat or facing similar hurdles, this post has insights to help you streamline your development workflow 📈. Tugboat time! Whoop x2! I finally got a chance to take Tugboat for a spin on the weekend. What’s that? Its a service that lets you have working versions of your website/app for each branch in your code repository. So what? Well, it means each time your new feature is ready, you can spin up a new version of your app, then flick the link off to your client or QA team to test and review. And...

Talofa! I came across an interesting video on how enterprise software development workflows might work. I found that I was using a hybrid of techniques mentioned which aligned well given that it was showing how BIG companies with teams of developers would develop software. We have a few software developers at SPREP but mostly work on our own projects . I thought I would reflect on my workflow as it is something that I've built up over time from research and collaboration with other developers. Tests, Continuous Integration/ Continuous Deployment (CI/CD) My workflow involves setting up tests from the get go and putting them into Gitlab CI pipelines . This gives me confidence that the system builds and I'm not breaking stuff I already fixed . Here is an example of how I would set up a Drupal project with style tests and a Github Action for running them. Feature building with Git branches I build features using git branches . If I have an urgent requirement or fix , I can switch ...

 Upgrading ensures our sites and apps remain secure with security patches as needed. They will also continue to receive feature enhancements going forward. Today I deployed the Drupal 10 upgrade for the SPREP Virtual Library . It was completed over a 3 week period while juggling the day-to-day support requests, meetings and providing technical advise. In contrast, I later upgraded and deployed one of our smaller apps with no custom code in just 2 hours. Upgrading from Drupal 9 to Drupal 10 involves a series of critical steps and considerations to ensure a smooth transition. This post looks at how to upgrade then outlines key lessons learned and best practices from the upgrade process, focusing on Drupal configurations, Docker environments, and CI/CD pipeline adjustments. How do you upgrade?   1. Start with installing the Upgrade Status module which will check if you are ready for an upgrade.  2. Uninstall any deprecated core modules and themes 3. Reduce the clutter and...