Importing a remote database and files into Lando using Laravel Envoy

Written by: Geoff St. Pierre

Updated 1 year ago

If you are hosted on a server like Linode, Digital Ocean, AWS or the like you can still cook up a lando pull command to pull your database and/or file assets down from production using Laravel Envoy.

This will work for all Lando apps that extend from laempy recipes like: LAMP, LEMP, Dupal 6/7/8, Backdrop, Joomla, WordPress and Laravel.

Requirements

We'll need a few things to get this set up for our laempy apps. We need to require the laravel/envoy composer package in our app, configure a .env file, configure an Envoy.blade.php file to define our tasks, and configure some tooling in our .lando.yml file. Let's jump in.

laravel/envoy

To get the laravel/envoy package just use composer:

lando composer require laravel/envoy

.env

If you don't have a .env file create one and add this to it, if you already have on just add this:

LP_DB_PWD=<your_db_password>
LP_DB=<your_db_name>
LP_PROJECT_ROOT=<path/to/project/root/on/your/server> # like: /var/www/myapp
LP_SITE_ROOT=<path/to/site/root> # like for nested web root /var/www/myapp/web
LP_DB_BACK_PATH=<path/to/db/backups> # like /home/me/backups/appname/dbs
LP_FILES_BACK_PATH=<path/to/files/backups/f.tgz # like /home/me/backups/appname/files/f.tgz
LP_SSH_CMD=<user>@<server_ip> # like me@server_ip

after creating or updating your .env file you'll need to rebuild the app.

lando rebuild -y

Envoy.blade.php

Create a file in the root of your app called Envoy.blade.php and add this to it:

@setup
  $ssh = getenv('LP_SSH_CMD');
@endsetup

@servers(['web' => $ssh, 'localhost' => '127.0.0.1'])

@story('pull')
  dump
  getdb
  cleandb
  backupfiles
  getfiles
  cleanfiles
@endstory

@task('dump', ['on' => 'web'])
  mysqldump -u root -p{{ getenv('LP_DB_PWD') }} {{ getenv('LP_DB') }} > {{ getenv('LP_DB_BACK_PATH') }}
@endtask

@task('getdb', ['on' => 'localhost'])
  scp {{ getenv('LP_SSH_CMD') }}:{{ getenv('LP_DB_BACK_PATH') }} db.sql
@endtask

@task('cleandb', ['on' => 'web'])
  rm {{ getenv('LP_DB_BACK_PATH') }}
@endtask

@task('backupfiles', ['on' => 'web'])
  cd {{ getenv('LP_SITE_ROOT') }}
  tar czf {{ getenv('LP_FILES_BACK_PATH') }} files
@endtask

@task('getfiles', ['on' => 'localhost'])
  scp {{ getenv('LP_SSH_CMD') }}:{{ getenv('LP_FILES_BACK_PATH') }} /app/f.tgz
@endtask

@task('cleanfiles', ['on' => 'web'])
  rm {{ getenv('LP_FILES_BACK_PATH') }}
@endtask

.lando.yml

In your .lando.yml file tell Lando about your .env file and add tooling for the pull command.

If you don't have an env_file section add one.

env_file:
  - .env

If you just added this your app will require a rebuild.

lando rebuild -y

In your tooling section add.

tooling:
  envoy:
    service: appserver
  pull:
    service: appserver
    description: Pull and import the database from production.
    cmd:
      - appserver: envoy run pull
      - database: /helpers/sql-import.sh db.sql
      - appserver: rm db.sql
      - appserver: rm -rf /app/web/files # change this to the /path/to/file/assets for your app.
      - appserver: tar xvzf f.tgz -C /app/web
      - appserver: rm f.tgz

Using the pull command

Now to use your pull command you'll need to configure the backups directories as specified in LP_DB_BACK_PATH and LP_FILES_BACK_PATH to exist on your server. Then just run:

lando pull

and that will backup your db and file assets and pull them down for you! Happy Lando travels folks.