Drupal Development on a Thumb Drive

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Drupal Development on a Thumb Drive

I mostly a .NET developer but need to do some new work in Drupal.

So I guess I need a portable
- Apache
- PHP
- MySQL
- phpMyAdmin
- Drupal codebase

What is the best way to work with the environment on a portable / thumb drive? I'm on Windows. I want to go portable because I work on 3 to 4 different machines throughout the week. Is there an equivalent to InstantRails but for PHP/Drupal?

+1 A:

You can install cygwin on your drive. It is self contained, so moving it around is simple. Then simply install the package versions of Apache, MySql and PHP. Once you got that stack up running, installing drupal is just a matter of downloading the newest version, unzip into the web root and follow instructions. PHP is a lot easier to configure than many other stacks.

troelskn 2009-10-21 19:27:36

Do you have some references to the best way to do cygwin on a thumb drive? You just saved me from asking that question a month from now. +1

tyndall 2009-10-21 21:39:49

Good question. Honestly, it's been a while since I've used Windows, so I don't really remember the details, but I think you can simply install the thing into a dir and then move this dir to your thumb drive.

troelskn 2009-10-22 07:02:40

+2 A:

Something I've used in the past is a combination of the portable XAMPP package along with DropBox.

The XAMPP package gives you all the development tools you need. Install it to your DropBox folder and keep the same development copy in sync on your 3 - 4 different machines.

quickcel 2009-10-21 20:52:38

I'd go with a portable version of XAMPP myself. Less of a headache then setting up a full LAMP stack.

PrairieHippo 2009-10-22 19:10:07

should work in pendrives as well.

barraponto 2009-12-06 06:22:50

important note: use XAMPP version 1.7.1 (current drupal 6.14 won't work with php 5.3)

barraponto 2009-12-06 06:23:51

Best way to get up and running on Windows is to use the [Acquia Drupal stack installer for Windows][1]. You'll have to investigate best options at that point for thumb drive use or machine syncing using Dropbox or LiveMesh. I would probably go with the syncing route rather than with portable thumb drive. I have used Portable Apps XAMP before and was impressed.

[1]: http://Acquia Drupal stack installer for Windows

Mike Munroe 2009-10-22 20:06:43

+1 This is a good idea. Unfortunatey for me my dayjob blocks Dropbox and Livemesh and other sites/services like this.

tyndall 2009-10-26 17:04:24

I recently switch from USBWebserver, which is a completely portable stack that works really well. The only thing missing is a mail service, but I'm sure with enough tinkering, one can get one installed.

I switched to the Acquia Drupal stack simply because of its design. I work almost entirely in Drupal now, so this was ideal. Best of all, email service included. Now if I can just get it portable so I don't have separate databases on each workstation, I'll be good to go. In the meantime, I use Subversion and Dropbox to keep my files in synch. I know, it's overkill to use both, but Dropbox makes sure my "local" copies are synched in case I forget to do a commit.

Marc Cepeda 2009-12-01 18:19:12

ansaurus

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Drupal Development on a Thumb Drive

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