Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION xxv PART I: AN OVERVIEW OF HEROKU
CHAPTER 1: HOW HEROKU WORKS 3
How the Stacks Stack Up 4
Understanding Dynos and the Dyno Manifold 6
Understanding Dyno Isolation 8
Exploring the Process Model 8
Understanding Erosion Resistance 10
Managing Version Control 11
Understanding the Slug Compiler 12
Routing HTTP Requests 13
Summary 15
CHAPTER 2: ARCHITECTURAL CONSIDERATIONS 17
Building Twelve-Factor Applications 18
Managing Your Application Portfolio with Pace Layering 21
Systems of Record 21
Systems of Differentiation 21
Systems of Innovation 22
Classification 22
Security and Reliability 22
Governance 23
Application Portfolio Management 23
Ensuring Security and Compliance 25
Physical Security and Safeguards 25
Network Security 25
Dyno- and Stack-Layer Security 26
Data Retention 27
Dealing with Security Issues 27
Certifications, Accreditations, and Compliance 27
Understanding Redundancy and Reliability 28
Disaster Recovery and Availability Zones 28
Availability and Transparency 29
Securing Your Heroku Application 31
Use a Strong Password for Your Heroku Account 31
Encrypt All Data in Transit 32
Encrypt Sensitive Data at Rest 32
Use Best Practices for Secure Development 32
Don’t Reinvent the Wheel 32
Verify Security and Compliance Needs with
Third-Party Providers 32
Monitor Your Application’s Logs 33
Encrypting Communications with SSL 33
Piggybacking on Heroku’s SSL Certificate 33
Using SSL Endpoint 34
Storing Static Assets and Using CDNs 36
Storing Static Assets on Amazon S3 36
Speeding Up International Applications with Amazon CloudFront 41
Summary 43
CHAPTER 3: PORTING YOUR APPLICATIONS TO HEROKU 45
Understanding Differences from Traditional Filesystems 46
Ephemeral Filesystems 47
Multi-Dyno Applications 47
Considerations for Porting Existing Applications 47
Choosing a Data Store 48
Using Heroku Postgres as a Data Store 48
Using Database.com as a Data Store 49
Using Add-On Data Stores 50
Using a Third-Party Data-as-a-Service Provider 50
Using Multiple Data Stores 51
Considerations for Porting Existing Applications 51
Managing Sessions 51
Understanding Caching 52
Storing Static Assets 54
Managing Configuration Variables 54
Replacing Web Servers and Containers 55
Managing Dependencies 56
E-Mailing from Your Application 57
Running Cron Jobs 57
Understanding Logging 59
Relying on External Programs 61
Scaling Up versus Scaling Out 62
Binding to Ports 62
Managing Long-Running Processes 63
Shutting Down Gracefully 65
Moving Your Domain 66
HTTPS over SSL 66
Considerations for Porting Existing Applications 67
Summary 68
PART II: CREATING AND MANAGING HEROKU APPLICATIONS
CHAPTER 4: DEPLOYING YOUR APPLICATIONS TO HEROKU 73
Installing the Heroku Toolbelt 73
Git 74
Foreman 75
The Heroku Client 76
Interacting with Heroku via the Command-Line Interface 77
The Magic of git push 79
Post Deploy Hooks 80
Navigating the Heroku Dashboard 80
Changing Your Application’s Name 82
Adding Custom Domains 83
Adding Custom Collaborators 83
Scaling Resources 84
Summary 87
CHAPTER 5: MANAGING RELEASES WITH HEROKU 89
Managing Multiple Environments 90
Managing Configuration Variables 94
Securing Development Environments 97
Versioning and Rolling Back Releases 100
Using Deploy Hooks 102
Managing Planned Downtime and Custom Error Pages 103
Implementing Continuous Integration 107
Summary 114
CHAPTER 6: WORKING WITH ADD-ONS 115
The Heroku Add-On Ecosystem 116
Architectural Considerations 117
Exploring Popular Add-Ons 117
SQL-Based Data Stores 118
NoSQL-Based Data Stores 118
Search 119
Logging and Monitoring 120
Installing Add-Ons 121
Installing Add-Ons from the Heroku Dashboard 122
Installing Add-Ons from the Command-Line Interface 125
Creating Add-Ons 127
Summary 131
CHAPTER 7: MANAGING, MONITORING, AND SCALING YOUR HEROKU APPLICATIONS 133
Adding Custom Domains 133
Viewing Logs and Associated Tools 136
Managing and Tuning Performance 140
Performance Management with New Relic 141
Performance Tuning Guidelines 145
Leveraging the Heroku API 145
Administration Options 146
Mobile 146
Multi-Accounts 149
Heroku Manager 150
Summary 153
PART III: USING A DATA STORE WITH YOUR HEROKU APPLICATIONS
CHAPTER 8: USING HEROKU POSTGRES AS A DATA STORE FOR YOUR HEROKU APPLICATIONS 157
Getting Started with Heroku Postgres 159
Understanding Continuous Protection 159
Understanding Automated Health Checks 160
Creating a Higher-Availability Database Architecture 160
Creating Databases 161
Forking Databases 164
Creating Database Followers 164
Managing Databases 166
Monitoring Databases 166
Choosing the Right Plan 167
Deleting Databases 168
Backing Up Data 169
Importing Data 171
Using Advanced Features 173
Sharing Information with Data Clips 173
Using hstore for Schema-Free Data Storage 174
Cancelling Queries 176
Creating a Sample App 176
Summary 179
CHAPTER 9: USING DATABASE.COM AS A DATA STORE FOR YOUR HEROKU APPLICATIONS 181
Getting Started with Database.com 182
Creating a Database 183
Importing and Exporting Data 188
Managing Your Database 191
Creating a Sample Application 193
Managing Users 198
Authenticating Users 198
Using Advanced Features 199
Understanding Profiles and Sharing 199
Enforcing Data Integrity with Validation Rules 200
Automating with Workflow Rules 201
Managing Change with Test Databases 202
Storing Files 203
Automating with Apex Triggers 203
Leveraging Social Graphs 204
Summary 204
CHAPTER 10: USING THIRD-PARTY DATA STORES FOR YOUR HEROKU APPLICATIONS 207
SQL-Based Options 207
MySQL 208
Alternative Postgres — JustOneDB 215
NoSQL-Based Options 217
MongoDB 218
Redis 220
Apache Cassandra 222
Apache CouchDB 224
Attaching Existing Data Stores 226
Summary 229
PART IV: PROGRAMMING ON HEROKU’S POLYGLOT PLATFORM
CHAPTER 11: DEVELOPING WITH RUBY 233
Understanding Ruby 234
Installing Ruby on Your Local Workstation 234
Managing Dependencies 235
Creating an Application with the Rails Framework 238
Writing the Application 238
Signing Up for a Twilio Account 244
Deploying the Application to Heroku 244
Testing the Application 247
Creating an Application with the Sinatra Framework 248
Writing the Application 248
Deploying the Application to Heroku 251
Testing the Application 253
Using Delayed Job for Background Jobs 253
Setting Up Delayed Job 255
Deploying the Application to Heroku 257
Testing Delayed Job 258
Caching with Ruby 261
Porting Ruby Applications to Heroku 263
Summary 265
CHAPTER 12: DEVELOPING WITH JAVA 267
Understanding Java 268
Writing Enterprise Applications on Heroku 268
Installing the Java Development Kit 271
Installing on Windows 271
Installing on Mac OS X 272
Installing on Linux 272
Managing Dependencies 272
Writing a Containerless Application with Embedded Jetty 275
Writing an Application with the Spring Framework
and Hibernate on Tomcat 281
Writing an Application with the Play Framework 286
Deploying a WAR File Directly to Heroku 294
Additional Considerations 295
Porting Java Applications to Heroku 296
Session Management and Caching 297
Memory Management 298
Continuous Integration 298
Summary 298
CHAPTER 13: DEVELOPING WITH OTHER SUPPORTED LANGUAGES 301
Developing with Python 302
Additional Considerations 309
Developing with Node.js 311
Additional Considerations 317
Developing with Clojure 319
Additional Considerations 326
Developing with Scala 328
Additional Considerations 334
Developing with Groovy Using the Grails Framework 336
Additional Considerations 341
Developing Non-Facebook Applications on PHP 343
Additional Considerations 346
Summary 349
CHAPTER 14: UNDERSTANDING BUILDPACKS 351
How Buildpacks Work 352
bin/detect 353
bin/compile 353
bin/release 358
Developing .NET Applications on Heroku 359
Developing Perl Applications on Heroku 362
Packaging Binary Buildpack Dependencies 366
Creating Custom Buildpacks 370
Building the Blassic Binary on Vulcan 370
Creating the Build Scripts 373
Pushing Your Buildpack to a Public Git Repository 376
Creating and Deploying Your Application to Heroku 377
Summary 380
PART V: CREATING A NEW GENERATION OF HEROKU APPLICATIONS
CHAPTER 15: BUILDING MOBILE APPLICATIONS WITH HEROKU 383
Understanding Mobile Development Architectures 384
Native Mobile Applications 384
HTML5 Mobile Applications 386
Hybrid Mobile Applications 387
Using a Central Data Repository for Mobile Applications 388
Writing an HTML5 Mobile Application 389
Creating the Back End 390
Creating the Front End 394
Using Toolkits and Add-Ons for Mobile Application Development 405
StackMob 405
Parse 406
RhoConnect 407
PubNub 409
BoxCar 409
Summary 409
CHAPTER 16: BUILDING SOCIAL APPLICATIONS WITH HEROKU 411
Writing Facebook Applications with PHP 412
Creating a Facebook Canvas Application 412
Writing the Contest App Code 416
Deploying the Application to Heroku 424
Making Heroku Applications Social with the Chatter API 429
Creating a Shadow Object in Database.com 430
Summary 444
APPENDIX: ADDITIONAL RESOURCES 445
The Heroku Website 445
The Heroku Dev Center 446
Professional Heroku Programming’s GitHub Repository 447
Log a Ticket with Heroku Support 447
Heroku Ninja 448
Heroku Java 449
Stack Overflow 450
Heroku Community Google Group 451
Heroku IRC Channel 451
Heroku’s Twitter Accounts 452
Heroku’s Offi cial Blog 453
Heroku News 454
Heroku on Facebook 455
Heroku Status 455
Heroku Postgres 456
Heroku Add-Ons 457
Heroku Add-On Provider Site 458
Database.com User Guide 459
Developer Force Integration 460
Force.com Discussion Boards 461
Heroku API Documentation 462
Heroku Partners 463
Heroku Beta Program Sign-Up 464
Heroku Success Stories 464
Heroku on Vimeo 465
Heroku Waza 466
The Twelve-Factor App 467
James Ward’s Blog 468
INDEX 469
