Running Joomla OpenShift for Free

My first post was running WordPress on OpenShift, so for all Joomla users I decided to show how easily you can get running Joomla on OpenShift for free also. I assume that you have OpenShift account and you read my first two posts if you are new with all of this.

For Joomla there is no predefined cartridge so you will need to install it manually. So go to create application and add PHP cartridge, give application name and create it. After that you will get git repo for your application, so you will have to install git client if you already don’t have one. Look at Git on Windows post if you want to use it on Windows machine. In this post I will use git on Linux.

When your application is created you will get name of your git repo and how to clone it locally. For Joomla installation you will need MySQL cartridge also, so go to your applications and add new cartridge along with PHP. Adding MySQL you will get all database information, like root user credentials. Write this info somewhere secure because you will need it for Joomla installation.

When both are added you need to add Joomla to you git repo. So go to Joomla web site and get Joomla. I prefer “.tar.gz” package, so I will use this.

Commands used on Linux machine:

wget http://joomlacode.org/gf/download/frsrelease/17715/77261/Joomla_2.5.8-Stable-Full_Package.tar.gz
tar zxvf Joomla_2.5.8-Stable-Full_Package.tar.gz -C joomla
git clone ssh://user@appName-namespace.rhcloud.com/~/git/appName.git/
cd appName/
cp -r ../joomla/* php/.
git add .
git commit -m "Joomla added"
git push

After all is done go to your application URL and install Joomla. As I already said in first two posts any change on application outside git repo will not be there if in meantime you do git push. The procedure for WordPress manual installation is basically the same. For features like adding custom domain read my first two posts.