My goal is to setup a GNU/Linux VM with Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, PHP8, Nginx and MySql to serve a Laravel 8 Application. For the Web Server I’m going to use Nginx so I will need php-fpm.

There are some ways to achieve that, you could consider to use:

• A software that helps you to maintain servers like Forge (https://forge.laravel.com/);
• A Serverless approach, using Vapor (https://vapor.laravel.com/);
• An App Platform like DigitalOcean App Platform (https://www.digitalocean.com/products/app-platform/)
• A Linux Virtual Machine provided by DigitalOcean Droplets.

For my side projects usually I use DigitalOcean Droplets because:

• It is a “manual” approach, but one of my goals, when I work on side project, is to learn and understand the processes/tools/configurations “under the hood”;
• The costs are predictable;
• I like to get my hands dirty on my side project.

For my work projects, I usually choose “managed” solutions.

A thought about automation. I’m a fan of “automate everything”. But before to automate a process, or a setup, or a workflow, I think we need to figure out what’s going on under the hood.

#nginx #ubuntu #laravel #php