A frontend (web UI), part of the Civil Legal Advice product.
Used by call centre operators and specialist providers to view & edit information about a case.
Comprises:
It depends on a cla_backend, an API service, which is responsible for the data (cases and users) and eligibility business logic.
Install (https://www.docker.com/products/docker-desktop/) on your Mac/Linux box
Ensure you are allocated a Docker licence: log into https://hub.docker.com/ with Google SSO. (Optionally in Docker Desktop app you can log in using Docker Hub)
You can check the Docker daemon is running:
docker info
It's suggested to use 'nvm' to install this old version of Node.
Install NVM: https://github.com/nvm-sh/nvm#install--update-script
Install the NodeJS version:
nvm install 8.9
You can check your NodeJS version:
node --version
"pyenv" is used to provide python2. (Recent MacOS versions no longer include python2, and Homebrew no longer provides it.)
Install pyenv with brew:
brew install pyenv
Set up your shell for pyenv. Make the changes to ~/.zshrc
described here: Set up your shell for pyenv (This is so that pyenv's python binary can be found in your path)
To make the shell changes take effect:
exec "$SHELL"
(or alternatively, restart your shell)
Install into pyenv the python version this repo uses (which is defined in .python-version
):
pyenv install 2.7.18 --skip-existing
[!TIP] It is recommended to use Docker for local development, for installation instuctions using Docker please see here.
Clone this repository:
git clone git@github.com:ministryofjustice/cla_frontend.git
Ensure you have the right Python version on the path:
cd cla_frontend
python --version
Ensure it reports Python 2.7.18
. (This should match the version .python-version
. If it's not correct, check your pyenv shell setup.)
Update 'pip' and install 'virtualenv' (in pyenv's python 2.7.18 environment):
pip install -U pip
pip install virtualenv
Create the python environment:
virtualenv -p python2.7 env --prompt=cla_fe
Activate the python environment - Linux and Mac:
source env/bin/activate
or on Windows:
env\scripts\activate
Install Python dependencies:
pip install -r requirements/generated/requirements-dev.txt
Create a local.py
settings file from the example file - on Linux and Mac:
cp cla_frontend/settings/.example.local.py cla_frontend/settings/local.py
or on Windows:
copy cla_frontend\settings\.example.local.py cla_frontend\settings\local.py
Install node packages:
./npm_git_wrapper.sh
Note: We use this "npm_git_wrapper.sh" rather than call "npm install" directly. This is a temporary hack due to the older version of node needing particular git settings for npm install to work. Do NOT use npm install
directly for the time being.
Install bower packages:
npm run bower
Compile assets:
npm run build
Install the Angular app's "socket server" (server-side) packages. Open a 2nd terminal and run:
cd cla_frontend/cla_socketserver/
npm install
node app.js
Leave this running. Return to your 1st terminal.
Ensure cla_backend is running - see Running CLA Backend.
Point cla_frontend at cla_backend:
export BACKEND_BASE_URI=http://localhost:8010
You need to set SECRET_KEY. For local development it doesn't need to be secure, so just do:
export SECRET_KEY=dummy
Start the Django server:
python ./manage.py runserver 8001
By default you can sign in with username: test_operator
password: test_operator
. If you have errors, see: Troubleshooting.
It's recommended to use the docker-compose method of running CLA Backend:
git clone git@github.com:ministryofjustice/cla_backend.git
cd cla_backend
./run_local.sh
You should be able to browse it at: http://localhost:8010/
Point cla_frontend at it with:
export BACKEND_BASE_URI=http://localhost:8010
We suggest you should keep 3 terminals (+1 for the backend):
Django runserver:
cd cla_frontend
source env/bin/activate
export BACKEND_BASE_URI=http://localhost:8010
export SECRET_KEY=dummy
./manage.py runserver 8001
Socket server:
cd cla_frontend/cla_socketserver/
npm install
node app.js
Gulp watching and compiling the assets
cd cla_frontend
gulp build && gulp watch
Backend
cd cla_backend
./run_local.sh
If using the Django Toolbar, include the following in your local.py
:
if DEBUG:
CSP_DEFAULT_SRC = ("self", "unsafe-inline", "unsafe-eval", 'ajax.googleapis.com', 'data:', 'localhost:8005')
Assets are managed using gulp.js. To compile the assets once, after a pull for example, run:
npm run build
Any problems with npm which could be resolved by installing all the
modules again? Try deleting the node_modules
directory and running
npm install
again.
npm test
The browser tests reside in https://github.com/ministryofjustice/laa-cla-e2e-tests. Follow the instructions to get these running on your local machine.
If you want to run the tests whilst developing, you'll need to update docker-compose.yml
from:
cla_frontend:
image: [url_to_remote_image]
to something like:
cla_frontend:
build:
context: ../cla_frontend
where the context directory is set to the root of the cla_public directory.
When making frequent changes to the assets you can run a gulp watch command to instantly compile any assets. To watch the source assets, leave the following command running in a terminal:
npm run watch
The watch
task allows you to use livereload with this project. The easiest
way to utilise livereload is to:
'ws://'
to CSP_DEFAULT_SRC
in local.py
. Full
example:if DEBUG:
CSP_DEFAULT_SRC = ("self", "unsafe-inline", "unsafe-eval", 'ajax.googleapis.com', 'data:', 'cdn.ravenjs.com', 'app.getsentry.com', 'ws://')
npm run watch
Now any changes in the assets folder will automatically reload the site in Chrome.
To lint with Black and flake8, install pre-commit hooks:
. env/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements/generated/requirements-dev.txt
pre-commit install
To run them manually:
pre-commit run --all-files
Stylesheets are located in cla_frontend/assets-src/stylesheets
and are compiled into
cla_frontend/assets/stylesheets
. They are written in Sass using the scss
syntax.
To compile the stylesheets run:
npm run sass
Javascripts files are located in cla_frontend/assets/src/javascripts
and are concatinated into cla_frontend/assets/javascripts
. To
compile the javascript files run:
npm run js
Image are optimised and copied into the cla_frontend/assets/images
folder using gulp. Source images should be stored in
cla_frontend/assets-src/images
. To optimise and copy images into assets run:
npm run images
If on Sign In you get "Forbidden. CSRF verification failed", then clear your cookies and start again. It is due to finding cookies from previously running a different Django site on 127.0.0.1. (You can use 'localhost' for one to avoid this.)
If on Sign In you get "There was a problem submitting the form. Please enter a correct username and password.", it might also be due to no response on the configured BACKEND_BASE_URI. Check that is configured correctly to point at a working cla_backend instance.
If the application does not run because SECRET_KEY is not defined, then add SECRET_KEY as an environment variable.
If the application runs but you get a 400 error (Bad request) when using 127.0.0.1:8001 then you will need to update the ALLOWED_HOSTS environment variable.
If the application runs locally but there are no images then this means that DEBUG is set to False. Add the following line to local.py to change it to True.
DEBUG = True
If you wish to view the Disregards questions in the eligibility templates then set the following flag in local.py
SHOW_DISREGARDS_FEATURE_FLAG = True
docker-compose up
This should start up the backend and frontend with compiled assets. All you need to do is go to http://localhost:8001.
Known Issues:
clabackend
and db
containers might not be ready first time round so you might have
to stop the docker-compose up and then run it again.
feature_branch.<sha>
reference from the build
job's "Push Docker image" step. Eg:
Pushing tag for rev [9a77ce2f0e8a] on {https://registry.service.dsd.io/v1/repositories/cla_frontend/tags/dual-docker-registries.902c45d}
feature_branch.<sha>
.
tag
is the branch that needs to be released plus a specific 7-character prefix of the Git SHA. (dual-docker-registries.902c45d
for the above example).environment
is the target environment, select depending on your needs, eg. "demo", "staging", etc.branch
is the deploy repo's default branch name, usually master.master
.master
branch.master.<sha>
reference from the build
job's "Push Docker image" step. Eg:
Pushing tag for rev [d96e0157bdac] on {https://registry.service.dsd.io/v1/repositories/cla_frontend/tags/master.b24490d}
master.<sha>
to training.:warning: Release to production outside of business hours
Business hours: 09:00 to 20:00
Why? Any downtime on the frontend and backend between 09:00 and 20:00 can have serious consequences, leading to shut down of the court legal advice centres, possible press reports and maybe MP questions.
Is there downtime when a release occurs? Usually it's just a few seconds. However changes that involve Elastic IPs can take a bit longer.
master
.master
branch.master.<sha>
reference from the build
job's "Push Docker image" step. Eg:
Pushing tag for rev [d96e0157bdac] on {https://registry.service.dsd.io/v1/repositories/cla_frontend/tags/master.b24490d}
master.<sha>
to production.:tada: :shipit: