Deployment in ShipMySaaS#

ShipMySaaS provides a fully automated deployment system to quickly deploy your application to your preferred VPS. With Docker, Docker Compose, and a GitHub Action included, deploying your SaaS is streamlined and efficient, saving you valuable time.

Command to run on your VPS only once (for the first time)#

1. Connect to your VPS as the root user.

2. Change the SSH port on your VPS:

   • Edit the SSH configuration file:

     sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config
   • Locate the line that starts with #Port 22 and change it to your preferred port (e.g., Port 51011). Remove the # at the beginning of the line to uncomment it.
   • Save the file and exit (press Ctrl+X, then Y to confirm, and Enter to save).
   • Restart the SSH service:

     sudo systemctl restart ssh
     # Or
     sudo reboot

3. Create a non-root user (example: shipmysaas):

   sudo adduser shipmysaas

4. Install Docker (for Ubuntu):

   a. Set up Docker's repository:

   sudo apt-get update
   sudo apt-get install ca-certificates curl
   sudo install -m 0755 -d /etc/apt/keyrings
   sudo curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg -o /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.asc
   sudo chmod a+r /etc/apt/keyrings/docker.asc

   b. Add Docker's repository to Apt sources:

   echo \
     "deb [arch=$(dpkg --print-architecture) signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/docker.asc] https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu \
     $(. /etc/os-release && echo "$VERSION_CODENAME") stable" | \
     sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/docker.list > /dev/null
   sudo apt-get update

   c. Install Docker:

   sudo apt-get install docker-ce docker-ce-cli containerd.io docker-buildx-plugin docker-compose-plugin

5. Add the non-root user to the Docker group:

   sudo usermod -aG docker shipmysaas

6. Initialize Docker Swarm and create a network:

   docker swarm init
   docker network create --driver overlay web

7. Create the directory /run/secrets/shipmysaas and set proper permissions:

   sudo mkdir -p /run/secrets/shipmysaas
   sudo chown shipmysaas /run/secrets/shipmysaas
   sudo chmod 700 /run/secrets/shipmysaas

8. Create an SSH key for password-less connection in the release action:

   ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 4096 -C "[email protected]" -f ~/.ssh/id_rsa

9. Copy the public SSH key to your VPS:

   ssh-copy-id -i ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub shipmysaas@YOUR_VPS_IP

10. Copy the private key to your GitHub repository as the VPS_SSH_KEY secret.

Deployment setup#

• docker-compose.yml: Configures your services (backend, frontend, database, etc.).
• Dockerfile: Each application has its own Dockerfile. It define how to build the Docker image for your application.
• release.yml GitHub Action: Automates the deployment process.

This setup enables you to deploy your application in just a few minutes.

Running a release#

To deploy your application:

1. Trigger the release GitHub Action.
2. Specify the type of release:
   • Patch: For minor fixes.
   • Major: For significant updates.
3. Choose whether to update:
   • All applications (frontend, backend, etc.), or
   • Specific components (e.g., only the backend).

The GitHub Action will handle the entire process, from building the application to deploying it on your VPS.

Required environment variables#

To ensure a successful deployment, you must set the following environment variables in your GitHub repository:

• CLOUDFLARE_TOKEN: If your domains are managed via Cloudflare. (Adjustments to docker-compose.yml are needed if using another reverse proxy like Traefik.)
• MONGO_URL: The connection URL for your production MongoDB database.
• RESEND_SECRET_KEY: For email integration with Resend.
• STRIPE_SECRET_KEY: For payment processing with Stripe.
• VPS_SSH_KEY: The private SSH key to connect to your VPS.
• WABE_ROOT_KEY: The root key for your backend. You cange generate a ranadom secure key with the following command: openssl rand -base64 48 | tr -dc 'a-zA-Z0-9' | head -c 64.

If you want to add a new environment variable, you can add it to the .env.template file of your application.

For example in .env.template of the shipmysaas-back package:

MONGO_URL=$MONGO_URl

The key (before =) represent the name of the environment variable and the value (after =) is the name of the environment variable that you set on your GitHub repository.

Benefits of automated deployment#

• Time-saving: Deploy your application with minimal effort.
• Consistency: Ensures deployments are repeatable and free from manual errors.
• Scalability: Quickly update and scale your application as needed.
• Flexibility: Supports partial or full deployments based on your requirements.