Wordpress on Docker with Dokku

Requirements

• Git
• Composer
• Wordpress
• Dokku

How-to

For the Wordpress developer

1. Remove everything from your Wordpress installation with the exception of wp-content.
2. Download and put the following files present in this repository along with wp-content:
   • .htaccess
   • .user.ini
   • index.php
   • wp-config.php
   • composer.json
   • composer.lock
3. Make sure your .gitignore include these lines:
   • vendor/
   • wordpress/
   • wp-content/plugins/
   • wp-content/uploads/
4. But not these:
   • wp-config.php
   • .htaccess
5. Commit everything.

For the system administrator

1. Make sure you have support for dokku storage and the plugin for MariaDB installed.
2. Create a new application and mount two storage points:
   • /var/lib/dokku/data/storage/<application>/plugins:/app/wp-content/plugins
   • /var/lib/dokku/data/storage/<application>/uploads:/app/wp-content/uploads
3. Create and link a new database instance.
4. Move nginx.conf.d/wordpress.conf to /home/dokku/<application>/nginx.conf.d/wordpress.conf and restart nginx.
5. Deploy and profit.

You should set the following environment variables:

• WP_AUTH_KEY
• WP_SECURE_AUTH_KEY
• WP_LOGGED_IN_KEY
• WP_NONCE_KEY
• WP_AUTH_SALT
• WP_SECURE_AUTH_SALT
• WP_LOGGED_IN_SALT
• WP_NONCE_SALT

The database connection info is parsed from the DATABASE_URL set by the database plugin, so you don't have to worry. Optionally you can also set WP_DEBUG to true.

Important

Please note that there are some considerations in this setup:

• Plugins are managed by Wordpress and not added to your repository.
• The Wordpress installation is managed by Composer and not added to your repository. The version is set in composer.json (remember to also update composer.lock).
• You can't have plugins that write outside wp-content/plugins and wp-content/uploads since anything except these mount points will be erased on each deploy.
• Whenever you need to sync your development environment use a migration plugin to get a dump of the database as well as the uploaded assets.

References

• https://github.com/dokku-community/dokku-wordpress