TurnKey Linux appliance for MageBridge
Saturday, 10 September 2011
It's hidden way but very useful: Some time ago we released a TurnKey Linux appliance - ready for usage with MageBridge. This appliance allows you to setup a MageBridge environment quickly on your local computer using VMware or VirtualBox, but is also usable for setting up VPSs.
Setting up MageBridge ... and the hosting environment
MageBridge combines Joomla! and Magento into one environment, but Magento is such a heavy application, setting up a solid MageBridge shop requires more than just clicking together the software. It requires a fine-tuning for performance, and most of the tricks actually need to be applied to the hosting environment and not the website running on top of it.
Magento caching on tmpfs, MySQL query_cache, PHP realpath-settings, InnoDB buffer pool size, Apache KeepAlives, Linux filesystem optimization, mod_deflate & mod_expires - the list is long and complex. Wouldn't it be nice if somebody handed this all to you on a golden plate?
What is an appliance and what is TurnKey?
That's why there are appliances: An appliance is (most commonly) a virtual machine preconfigured with some kind of application. Because an application runs on top of an operating system, that operating system is also included with the appliance - most commonly Linux. There are numerous appliances available for free on the web - offering solutions for SugarCRM, Samba fileservers, Zimbra office-solutions, Moodle, WordPress, Drupal but also our favourites: Magento and Joomla!.
A lot of these free Linux-based virtual machines are offered on the site of TurnKey Linux. You can download an image there, configure it within your own virtualization application (so VMware of VirtualBox or something else) and startup the appliance. With MageBridge we thought: Hey, why not put Magento and Joomla! in one single appliance, so it is easier to get going with MageBridge?
So what about the MageBridge TurnKey Linux appliance?
The MageBridge TurnKey Linux appliance is basically based on a Joomla! appliance, but adds Magento to it as well. Because running a dedicated host for solely Joomla! requires very different configurations than a dedicated host for Joomla! and Magento, we have run down through the Linux OS to configure all relevant settings.
So (roffle) can MageBridge be used for free with this appliance? No, it can not. The appliance ships with Joomla!, Magento and some pre-configured settings of MageBridge. But MageBridge first needs to be installed. You can either do this using the TRIAL-key or a full membership-license.
Get the MageBridge appliance
The MageBridge TurnKey Linux appliance is available here.