flask-testing

An example repository of a Python Flask based webapp running in docker.

Docker

To run the project locally, install Docker.

Dev

Prior to starting the project, create a .env-dev file with the following variables:

# Example Variable
ENV_NAME=dev

# Entry point into flask app
FLASK_APP=app.py

# Enable Debugging
FLASK_DEBUG=1

# MongoDB credentials
MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_USERNAME=
MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_PASSWORD=

# mongo-express credentials - same as MongoDB credentials
ME_CONFIG_MONGODB_ADMINUSERNAME=
ME_CONFIG_MONGODB_ADMINPASSWORD=
ME_CONFIG_MONGODB_SERVER=mongo

Then run docker compose up. This will start the flask app in development mode and should be available at http://localhost:5000.

In the development build, code changes will automatically reload so there is no need to restart the docker container after making a change.

mongo-express

For your convenience, I included mongo-express in the docker dev stack. It can be accessed at http://localhost:8081. This is only available when running in dev mode.

Prod

If you would like to run the production version of the project locally, create a file named .env-prod with the following contents:

# Example Variable
ENV_NAME=production

# Entry point into flask app
FLASK_APP=app/app.py

# MongoDB credentials
MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_USERNAME=
MONGO_INITDB_ROOT_PASSWORD=

Next build the docker image with docker-compose build, then run docker compose -f docker-compose.yml up.

Unlike the development build, changes to the source code will not auto reload. To see your new changes, you must bring the containers down, rebuild the container and launch it again. In a perfect world, you will never have to run the production version locally.

Helpful tips

You may append a -d to docker-compose start commands to detach the shell after starting the project. To bring the container down after starting it, run docker-compose down. If you start the container without the -d flag, press CTRL-C in the terminal to shutdown the containers.