nin

nin is Node INstaller, the missing nodejs app deploy tool.

nin tries to solve a trival-but-bother problem: how to deploy your nodejs app ?

The manual method

When I manually deploy a nodejs app, I do

1. Copy the project pkg and extract all files to deployment site dir.
2. Change to that dir, npm install all my dependencies.
3. After that, manually do some setup things, such as bash sth.sh or grunt.
4. Finally start the app with node index.js or even forever index.js. (In this step I usually save my app's pid in some file for future.)
5. And when there is a need, I stop the app with pid saved before.

So why not to make some tool to automate that process?

That is what nin do.

The nin method

Suppose you have your project in /path/to/yourapp or git://github.com/yourname/yourapp.git, with your nin.json conf file well prepared,

1. mkdir yourapp_deploy; cd yourapp_deploy
2. nin install /path/to/yourapp or nin install git://github.com/yourname/yourapp.git

Done. You app is installed and configured by nin.

Then you can nin start yourapp to start it or nin stop yourapp to stop it.

Installation

npm install -g nin

or locally

curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/liyu1981/nin/master/install.sh | sh

Dependencies

• nodejs >0.10.0
• npm >1.4.0

Command Line Summary

  Usage: nin [options] [command]

  Commands:

    deploy <pkg>           Install your app.
      > <pkg> can be any llegal npm pkg names.
      > Ref https://www.npmjs.org/doc/cli/npm-install.html

    install <pkg>          Install your app.
      > This equals deploy then setup.
      > <pkg> can be any llegal npm pkg names.
      > Ref https://www.npmjs.org/doc/cli/npm-install.html

    remove [options] <pkgname> Remove your app.
      > <pkgname> is the pkg installed dir name, i.e., some name in <cwd>/apps/

    restart <pkgname>      restart your app.
      > This equals stop then start your app.
      > <pkgname> is the pkg installed dir name, i.e., some name in <cwd>/apps/

    setup <pkgname>        Setup your app.
      > <pkgname> is the pkg installed dir name, i.e., some name in <cwd>/apps/

    start <pkgname>        Start your app.
      > <pkgname> is the pkg installed dir name, i.e., some name in <cwd>/apps/
      > pid file will write to var/<pkgname>

    stop <pkgname>         Stop your app.
      > <pkgname> is the pkg installed dir name, i.e., some name in <cwd>/apps/

    update <pkgname>       Update your app.
      > <pkgname> is the pkg installed dir name, i.e., some name in <cwd>/apps/

    version [options]      Show version info.

  Options:

    -h, --help   output usage information
    -q, --quiet  turn on quiet mode

nin.json

nin.json is the configuration file of your app, which contains the intructions on how to setup/start/stop your app. It should be placed in the root dir (like package.json). The format is

{
  "setup": [
    { "type": "...", "content": "..." },
    ...
  ],
  "start": [
    { "type": "...", "content": "..." },
    ...
  ],
  "stop": [
    { "type": "...", "content": "..." },
    ...
  ]
}

setup

• type can be bash|grunt
• content is the relative path to your script/file.

start/stop

• type can be bash|forever
• content is the relative path to your script/file.

Project Example

Nothing can compared to an example. Check nin-example for different settings(in different git branch) of nin.