Developing WordPress in a cloud-based IDE

I haven’t used any of those sorts of services before for one big reason – I don’t control the code.

If everything is in “the cloud” then it means that the provider has control over everything, and as soon as they decide to shut down, move somewhere else, sell out, etc, that control goes with them.

I’m not saying that there’s no place for this, and I can see that it would be great to get out and do your work like that, but for coding there’s no need for a high-powered laptop. You may need something more than a Chromebook, but you certainly don’t need the “latest and greatest” to run a text editor and FTP program.

I can see some advantages in what you are looking for, like the mobility, ability to work from anywhere on (almost) any device, etc, but for me loosing control over my clients code makes that something that I personally would not do.

Disclamer I work for Codeanywhere.com

That being said this is one of the premier use cases of our App. Codeanywhere has over 400.000 Users on the service. So I definitely recommend you try us out.

Also, I would love to hear your feedback as to what you think of it.

Cheers!

Hi Tommy. Your offering does sound like what the OP is looking for.

But… As I voiced my concerns before, what is your companies policies on code ownership? Like, what happens if the account doesn’t pay the subscription fees, or something else happens, and the code goes “elsewhere?

For the record, I am not saying this to be disapproving, but just to ensure that things are in place to make sure that any submissions to your sort of service aren’t taken, and copied elsewhere without permission. ??

As I am a big fan of WordPress and the GPL, I do like to make sure that even if someones code doesn’t follow those standards it can be protected by what they expect.

I could set up a staging server, but that is still not ideal as there is a bunch of syncing you have to do between the two environments…

I guess I am a bit confused with this … which “other” environment would you need to sync the staging server to if you are developing on it?

Or, do you want the ability to work offline? That of course would not be an option with the services you listed or the one from Tommy B.

As your client’s sites will need to be hosted somewhere anyway, have you looked into the managed WordPress hosting products, most of which have easy staging to live functions.

Hi catacaustic,
I completely understand your concern regarding code ownership and want to say that all code is the sole property of the user.
Users can easily code on their own servers/hosting directly (all code is saved on their own hardware regardless of the status of their account on codeanywhere), save to their own Google Drive/Dropbox/Amazon S3 (again, all code is saved on their own Google Drive/Dropbox/Amazon S3 accounts separate from codeanywhere), or they can chose to run one or more of our DevBoxes. Our DevBoxes are linux containers that are on our hardware (and so is the code/data). All DevBoxes are archived (migrated from the active server to a backup) after 7 days of non-use, and permanently deleted (along with all code/data) after 6 months.

We have several paid and one free plan, so if a user decides (or forgets) to pay for a subscription they will be downgraded to the free plan where they will retain access to all of their code/data/servers.
Coding best practices (and logic) suggest you always keep multiple copies of your code, on multiple locations/providers (whenever possible). Since most of us are coders, we understand that sometimes “stuff” happens and whenever possible will do our best to help even former subscribers. Not because it’s good business but because we’ve all been in similar situations.

As far as the actual code is concerned, as long as it’s not damaging to us or others (viruses, malware, DDoS scripts or similar) we don’t really have any interest in what is coded. We don’t read, analyse, copy (ok, we copy DevBoxes as a whole for backup, but that gets deleted after 6 months) or heaven forbid sell/provide to others.

@lylechamney: The other environment would be the local dev environment on my computer, the staging server would be a hosted environment in “the cloud”.

@catacaustic: I do see your points, and they do have a place to think about. Thanks for bringing them up!

@tommy B: I will definately have to look into your option. Thank you for taking the time to post here!

Quick Question: If I spin up a DevBox for WordPress development, does it allow for me to install and compile sass/scss and the like? If so does it work on all of your accounts or is the free account out of luck?

all code is the sole property of the user.

Maybe on your service, but not all are like yours. ??
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There’s a lot of places out there that claim ownership over everything that’s uploaded. I’ve seen it before, and it’s not slowing down now. it all comes down to reading every sites TOS, which most people don’t do. ?? Just trying to save some one from having the problem of “I didn’t want my code public, but now it is” that happens a lot.

Again, that’s why I trust my own environments and servers, and why I don’t like putting my hard-earned code somewhere out of my control until after I’ve been paid for it. ?? At least when I’m developing for commercial clients. ??

Catacaustic: Which cloud ide’s have you come across that do this? I will definately take the time to view the TOS of the one I choose now thanks!

@ronald.fuquay: the free plan comes with 1 DevBox (paid plans have more ofc). They currently do not come with support for sass/scss out of the box, but you can install whatever you need just like on a standard Ubuntu/CentOS machine. The editor does have syntax highlighting for sass/scss but you’ll have to compile via the ssh terminal.

@catacaustic: thumbs up for looking out for the community. I looked over our terms and noticed that it’s not stated clearly enough that all code/data is the sole property of the user and that we have no claims to it. I’ve contacted the guys that handle the legal stuff to fix that.

Here is a suggestion: get a environment you own that you can SSH into and use Cloud9. You own the eniornment, so you own the code. You need a paid account, just FYI. As far as I know, CodeAnywhere does not give you the ability to use the GUI editors and folder structure in an SSH environment. Cloud9 does.

@ nmgwp: For all mission critical stuff, I personally prefer hosting my own environment. But when that’s not the case or simply not viable, hosted services are there and easily accessible.
Codeanywhere does have folder structure and editor for SSH (even on the free plan).

Tommy, I have a few more questions regarding Codeanywhere

Your free plan has one DevBox and one Custom Stack, does that mean you can only have one active project at any given time or you can only have one project total before upgrading the account?

I know you already discussed Codeanywhere’s policy on data/code ownership, but are the DevBoxes private or public?

Using the free plan, I see you have access to 1 share. Is that one user I can share multiple times with or one share total (aka they can only see it once during development)?

If I start up a DevBox for a wordpress install, can I also set it up to compile scss/less or is that not allowed? if it is allowed, do you have any scripts or easy set-up for javascript task runners/ruby/scss/compass/etc?

Can you pull or push to Github/bitbucket with your service?

does your web/cloud ide have autocomplete/hinting for html/css/scss/php/and javascript?

@ronald.fuquay: Custom Stacks are images you can make from an active DevBox. That way you only have to setup your desired environment once, and quickly deploy it unlimited times. One DevBox means can have only one at a time, when you delete it you can make a new one without upgrading your account.

The DevBoxes have a public DNS, but it’s a random string (so you can’t tell which DevBox belongs to who) and all access to it is controlled by you just like on a full fledged server (the default is only your account can access the SSH terminal).

One share means you can receive access to one other users share. You can access the share unlimited times until the share is revoked by the other user. The number of shares you can create and users to share them with is not limited.

You can pretty much install anything on the DevBox, we compiled the templates to make it easier for users to get started. That said, we don’t currently have scripts for setting up other services, your best bet would be to follow the developers instructions or man pages.

You can put your Git URL when creating a new DevBox otherwise you’ll have to do it from the SSH terminal. BitBucket has implemented a “edit in Codeanywhere” button.

We have hinting for html/css/php/and javascript, but no scss at the moment ??