Using Sinatra Unicorn and Heroku (CEDAR stack) Together!

I have been asked

• “How do I get started with Unicorn and Heroku?”
• “How can I made a remote HTTP webhook?”
• “How can I make a simple web service?” ,
• “How can I get started with a free ruby hosting evironment?”

I want to take a moment to answer a few of these questions in a small package I have extracted from one of our small services. This package is avalible on https://github.com/blazingcloud/sinatra-with-unicorn with a MIT License

This blog posts assumes basic familiarity with the ‘git’ command : http://gitimmersion.com/

• ‘$’ will prefix every command example:

Follow these steps to get started :

1. Login or create a github.com account
2. Visit https://github.com/blazingcloud/sinatra-with-unicorn in your web browser and ‘FORK’ the repository.
3. Rename your fork by clicking the ‘ADMIN’ button

• I gave mine a name off the top of my head : monkey-flyer-radio-protocol-death-claw-alpha

Follow these steps to set-up development:

I will follow each of the steps with the command that I used - replace ‘monkey-flyer-radio-protocol-death-claw-alpha’ with your project fork name

• clone your repository

• The repository has been setup to use bundler with a Gemfile - you will need to install bundler

• With bundler installed you can use the Gemfile to manage installation of gems :

Follow these steps to change the default GET uri ‘/’ and see the results

• open ./modules/site/main.erb in your editor
  • you can put html in here or text
• run the server

• open the browser up to http://localhost:5000
  • see it works!

• Use ‘CTRL-C’ to stop the server

Follow these steps to add a post uri ‘/deathclaw’ and see the results

• open ./modules/site.rb in your editor
  • this is a Sinatra Module - it has a get ‘/’ defined already.
• add a line of code in the body of the class after the ‘get’ part

• run your service again

• run a post with curl on the command line in a new console window

Check in your changes

Release to Heroku (ON CEDAR STACK)

• create a new heroku app ( i named mine )

• release your code to heroku ( heroku creates a git remote ‘heroku’ )
  • you should see messages about heroku recieving your push and installing your gems via bundler

• check your get

• check your post

DEBUGGING HELP

• foreman start
  • this command will not reload your code changes - you will need to use ‘rerun’ if you want that.
  • rails does this for free - at the cost of increased learning curve

• curl ARGS URL
  • no args
    • does a get
  • -d var=1
    • this tells curl to do a post with a post variable (unused, but simulates a post)