A Docker Compose setup for containerized CakePHP Applications

This setup spools up the following containers

• mysql (8.0)
• nginx
• php-fpm (php 8.1)
• mailhog (smtp server for testing)

The guide will walk you thru the following things

• Quick Start
• Installation
• How to use bin/cake, mysql and other commandline utils now that you're using containers
• OK, so what did the defaults set up?
• Installing Docker on my Host
• Troubleshooting
  • nginx open logs/access.log failed no such file or directory
  • creating a CakePHP app

For those looking to get started in 60 sec using just the defaults (which are fine for dev) do the following:

1. Download the ZIP file for this repo
2. Create the following folder structure

• Put your CakePHP app inside the cakephp folder (assumes you already have one; if not, look here)

• and the files from this repo into the docker folder

      myapp
          docker
              .. put the zip files in here ..
          cakephp
              .. put your cake app in here ..
  

  If you want to do that all from commandline...

  cd ~/path/to/your/local/dev/folder
  mkdir myapp
  mkdir myapp/cakephp

  And then to simultaneously download the latest master file, unpack it, stuff it into a folder named docker, and clone the .env file ... run this...

  cd myapp
  curl -Lo cakephp-docker.zip https://github.com/cwbit/cakephp-docker/archive/master.zip && \
  unzip cakephp-docker.zip && \
  mv cakephp-docker-master docker && \
  cp docker/.env.sample docker/.env
  rm cakephp-docker.zip

3. Move your cakephp app into the cakephp folder or if you're creating one from scratch skip to the next step

4. From commandline, cd into the docker directory and run docker-compose up

   $ cd /path/to/somefolder/docker
   $ docker-compose up
   
   Starting myapp-mysql
   Starting myapp-mailhog
   Starting myapp-php-fpm
   Starting myapp-nginx
   Attaching to myapp-mailhog, myapp-mysql, myapp-nginx, myapp-php-fpm
   myapp-mailhog  | 2024/06/12 15:59:39 Using in-memory storage
   myapp-mailhog  | 2024/06/12 15:59:39 [SMTP] Binding to address: 0.0.0.0:1025
   myapp-mailhog  | 2024/06/12 15:59:39 Serving under http://0.0.0.0:8025/
   myapp-mailhog  | [HTTP] Binding to address: 0.0.0.0:8025
   myapp-mailhog  | Creating API v1 with WebPath:
   myapp-mailhog  | Creating API v2 with WebPath:
   myapp-mysql    | 2024-06-12 15:59:39+00:00 [Note] [Entrypoint]: Entrypoint script for MySQL Server 8.0.27-1debian10 started.
   myapp-php-fpm  | [12-Jun-2024 15:59:39] NOTICE: fpm is running, pid 1
   myapp-php-fpm  | [12-Jun-2024 15:59:39] NOTICE: ready to handle connections
   myapp-php-fpm  | [12-Jun-2024 15:59:39] NOTICE: systemd monitor interval set to 10000ms
   myapp-nginx    | /docker-entrypoint.sh: /docker-entrypoint.d/ is not empty, will attempt to perform configuration
   myapp-nginx    | /docker-entrypoint.sh: Looking for shell scripts in /docker-entrypoint.d/
   myapp-nginx    | /docker-entrypoint.sh: Launching /docker-entrypoint.d/10-listen-on-ipv6-by-default.sh
   ... you'll probably see more crap spit out here ...

5. If you're creating a new cakephp app, follow the steps in creating a CakePHP app

6. That's it! Go to localhost:8180 and your app will be live.

All these defaults can be completely overridden. Start with the Installation section to get a feel for what's going on, and then tweak the defaults to suit your individual project needs.

Clone this repo (or just download the zip) and put it in a docker folder inside your root app folder

Here is an example of what my typical setup looks like

	myapp
		cakephp
			src
			config
			..
		docker
			.env
			.env.sample
			docker-compose.yml
			mysql
				my.cnf
			nginx
				nginx.conf
			php-fpm
				Dockerfile
				php-ini-overrides.ini

Next, Update the Environment File

Copy or Rename docker/.env.sample to docker/.env. This is an environment file that your Docker Compose setup will look for automatically which gives us a great, simple way to store things like your mysql database credentials outside of the repo.

By default the file will contain the following

MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=root
MYSQL_DATABASE=myapp
MYSQL_USER=myapp
MYSQL_PASSWORD=myapp

Docker Compose will automatically replace things like ${MYSQL_USER} in the docker-compose.yml file with whatever corresponding variables it finds defined in .env

Lastly, Find/Replace myapp with the name of your app.

WHY? by default the files are set to name the containers based on your app prefix. By default this is myapp. A find/replace on myapp is safe and will allow you to customize the names of the containers

e.g. myapp-mysql, myapp-php-fpm, myapp-nginx, myapp-mailhog

Build and Run your Containers

cd /path/to/your/app/docker
docker-compose up

That's it. You can now access your CakePHP app at

localhost:8180

tip: start docker-compose with -d to run (or re-run changed containers) in the background.

docker-compose up -d

Connecting to your database

Also by default the first time you run the app it will create a MySQL database with the credentials you specified in your .env file (see above)

host : myapp-mysql
username : myapp
password : myapp
database : myapp

You can access your MySQL database (with your favorite GUI app) on

localhost:8106

Your cakephp/config/app_local.php file should be set to the following (it connects through the docker link)

  'Datasources' => [
    'default' => [
      'host' => 'myapp-mysql',
      'port' => '3306',
      'username' => 'myapp',
      'password' => 'myapp',
      'database' => 'myapp',
    ],

To change these defaults edit the variables in the docker/.env file or tweak the docker-compose.yml file under myapp-mysql's environment section.

Now that you're running stuff in containers you need to access the code a little differently

You can run things like composer on your host, but if you want to run bin/cake or use MySQL from commandline you just need to connect into the appropriate container first

access your php server

docker exec -it myapp-php-fpm /bin/bash

remember to replace myapp with whatever you really named the container

access mysql cli

docker exec -it myapp-mysql /usr/bin/mysql -u root -p myapp

remember to replace myapp with whatever you really named the container and with your actual database name and user login

There are 4 containers that I use all the time that will be spooled up automatically

First we're creating an nginx server. The configuration is set based on the CakePHP suggestions for nginx and myapp-nginx will handle all the incoming requests from the client and forward them to the myapp-php-fpm server which is what actually runs your PHP code.

You can configure the nginx server by editing the /nginx/nginx.conf file

This container runs php (and it's extensions) needed for your CakePHP app

It automatically includes the following extensions

• php8.1-intl (required for CakePHP 4.0+)
• php8.1-mbstring (included in the base image)
• php8.1-sqlite3 (required for DebugKit)
• php8.1-mysql

It also includes some php ini overrides (see php-fpm\php-ini-overrides.ini)

This container will (by default) look for your web app code in ../cakephp/ (relative to the docker-compose file).

You can configure what PHP extensions are loaded by editing /php-fpm/Dockerfile

You can configure PHP overrides by editing /php-fpm/php-ini-overrides.ini

The first time you run the docker containers it will create a folder in your root structure called mysql (at the same level as your docker folder) and this is where it will store all your database data.

Since the data is stored on your host device you can bring the mysql container up and down or completely destroy and rebuild it without ever actually touching your data - it is "safely" stored on the host.

You can configure MySQL overrides by editing /mysql/my.cnf

This is just a built-in mail server you can use to 'send' and intercept mail coming from your application.

Set up your cakephp/config/app_local.php with the following

    'EmailTransport' => [
        ...
	    'mailhog' => [
	        # These are default settings for the MailHog container - make sure it's running first
	        'className' => 'Smtp',
	        'host' => 'myapp-mailhog',
	        'port' => 1025,
	        'timeout' => 30,
	      ],
	      ...

You can access the Web GUI (using the defaults) for mailhog at

localhost:8125

To send mail over the transport layer just set your Email::transport('mailhog')

If you've never worked with Docker before they have some super easy ways to install the needed runtimes on almost any host

• Mac, Windows, Ubuntu, Centos, Debian, Fedora, Azure, AWS

You can download the (free) community edition here https://www.docker.com/community-edition#/download

Cloud Hosting Docker Applications

DigitalOcean has been super reliable for us as a host and has a one-click deploy of a docker host.

Just click CREATE DROPLET and then under Choose an Image pick the One-click Apps (tab) and choose Docker X.Y.Z on X.Y and you're good to go; DO will spool up a droplet with docker and docker-compose already installed and ready to run.

submitted by @jeroenvdv

myapp-nginx | nginx: [emerg] open() "/var/www/myapp/logs/access.log" failed (2: No such file or directory)

This is caused by not installing CakePHP completely and can be fixed by creating the logs folder in your myapp/cakephp folder.

If you are starting fresh and need to install cake using the container you just created then follow the next step, Creating a CakePHP app.

Most of the time I set this up without an existing CakePHP app. This will cause the initial up command to fail because folders are missing. To solve this run the install command (from the official CakePHP docs) but set the app name to . instead of myapp.

docker exec -it myapp-php-fpm /bin/bash

remember to replace myapp with whatever you really named the container

and then, inside the container

composer create-project --prefer-dist cakephp/app:5.* .

Next, fix the database connection strings by following the steps in Connecting to your database (above).

That's it. You should have lots of happy green checkmarks at localhost:8180 or whatever you set nginx to respond to.