Get Started¶

Devpod makes it easy to prepare an environment for software development.
It works the same way on cloud computing instances like AWS EC2, in Docker
containers or on desktop machines.

Note that Devpod requires internet access in order to work.

Quick Install¶

There are two ways to Quick Install the Devpod: Quick Setup Base and Quick Toolset Setup

Quick Setup Base ¶

To install the base toolset first and the rest later, do this:

echo "download and run the $pwd init script"
wget -q -O - https://raw.githubusercontent.com/yairdar/devpod/main/init.sh | bash

echo "run idempotent setup process, only missing tools will be installed"
bash devpod/install-deps.sh setup-base

Following the Quick Install procedure you can install a minimal Developer Toolset.

It contains some basic utilities (curl wget git vim zip unzip), task (aka Tasker),
yq and zsh with oh my zsh extension framework and task autocompletions.

Tasker is the main automation tool in Devpod. It allows to run complex
multistep tasks with convenient commands in task taskname form.
Tasker uses YAML to describe the tasks, and it makes automation easy and intuitive.
That's why Devpod itself relies on Taskfile.
Yq is a YAML processor that supports JSON as well.
with yq we can use task to introspect other tasks or yaml/json configurations that gives it a lot of power
Zsh is a powerful shell that supports plugins, has an advanced autocompletion,
shorthands for most commonly used commands and vast customization capabilities.
Oh my zsh framework helps managing zsh configuration and and adds even more convenience.
Task autocompletions for zsh allow to autocomplete task names after task command.

In addition to this basic set you can install Custom Devops Parts that you need
with following commands:

Cloud Tools (GitHub CLI, AWS CLI)
- task setup-cloud-tools
Conda
- task setup-os-conda
Docker
- task setup-os-docker

echo "install custom devpod parts"
cd devpod
task  -p -o prefixed setup-cloud-tools setup-os-conda setup-os-docker  
# drop -p to disable parallelism

Quick Toolset Setup ¶

If you want to install any of Custom Parts right from the start, you can add
arguments to the Quick Install Command like this:

echo "download and run the $pwd init script"
wget -q -O - https://raw.githubusercontent.com/yairdar/devpod/main/init.sh | bash

echo "run idempotent setup process, only missing tools will be installed"
bash devpod/install-deps.sh setup-base setup-cloud-tools setup-os-docker

Arguments to choose from:

Cloud Tools (GitHub CLI, AWS CLI)
- setup-cloud-tools
Conda
- setup-os-conda
Docker
- setup-os-docker

How to install Devpod to the Docker container¶

Including Devpod to the Dockerfile is pretty straightforward:

RUN bash devpod/install-deps.sh setup-base <SETUP_CUSTOM_PARTS>

where <SETUP_CUSTOM_PARTS> can include setup-cloud-tools, setup-os-conda
and setup-os-docker.

You can see the example here. (update this line after merge)

The only consideration could be if you need task comlpetion for zsh in your
Docker container or not. If you do and your container doesn't include python3
you should setup it manually:

open your ~/.zshrc file and add task to plugins list:

plugins=(git task)
autoload -U compinit && compinit
source $ZSH/oh-my-zsh.sh

In most cases this feature is not that useful in Docker containers.

How to install Devpod to the cloud node¶

The procedure is pretty much the same for the cloud node that's for a local
machine or a remote server. Connect to the node over SSH and use any of two
Quick Install procedures.

How to tune Devpod for your project¶

You can add a custom taskfile to the devpod. It allows to minimize manual work
while preparing your systems for development.

The install-nodejs task example in this chapeter is realistic and not simplified.
If you want to learn how to use taskfiles, here's a comprehensive tutorial.

Here's how to add a custom installation automation to Devpod:

Create a taskfile in devpod directory with your favorite text editor, e.g.:

vim setup.custom.tools.yaml

Copy to this file:

# https://taskfile.dev

version: "3"

vars:
  MAYBE_SUDO: 
    sh: which sudo &> /dev/null && echo "sudo" || echo ""

tasks:
  default:
    cmds:
      - echo "{{.GREETING}}"
      - task -a
    silent: true

Note MAYBE_SUDO monade. It allows to run the same script on systems with and
without sudo.

Create your custom tools installation task, for example:

tasks:
  default:
    cmds:
      - echo "{{.GREETING}}"
      - task -a
    silent: true

  install-nodejs:
    desc: install node.js
    vars:
      DISTRO: linux-x64
      VERSION: v16.17.0
    cmds:
      - curl https://nodejs.org/dist/{{.VERSION}}/node-{{.VERSION}}-{{.DISTRO}}.tar.xz -o node.tar.xz
      - {{.MAYBE_SUDO}} mkdir -p /usr/local/lib/nodejs
      - {{.MAYBE_SUDO}} tar -xJvf node.tar.xz -C /usr/local/lib/nodejs
      - echo "export PATH=/usr/local/lib/nodejs/node-{{.VERSION}}-{{.DISTRO}}/bin:\$PATH" > ~/.profile
      - ~/.profile

Add a task to the Taskfile.yml that will call your new taskfile:

  setup-custom-tools:
    desc: Install node.js
    cmds:
    - task -t setup.custom.tools.yaml install-nodejs

Now you run Devpod installation like this to install nodejs with it:

bash devpod/install-deps.sh setup-base install-nodejs

How to contribute¶

You are welcome to offer contributions to Devpod via pull requests to the
GitHub repo.
If you have written a custom taskfile with automation for installation of
a common development tool, it's definitely worth sharing with community.