apex CLI Commands

Within the installation directory Apex comes with both, an apex.php script and an apex phar archive. Both are the exact same, but you may move the apex phar archive within your environment path (ie. /usr/bin/) allowing you to simply type "apex" instead of "./apex" to perform CLI commands.

Various CLI commands are built into Apex which help facilitate development and package / upgrade / theme management. You can view a list of all availble commands by typing "apex.php help" within terminal, and below explains all available commands.

1. General (package / upgrade / theme management)
2. Package / Upgrade Development
3. Component Development
4. System Maintenance
5. git / Github Integration
6. Remote Access Client

General Commands

Various general CLI commands are available allowing you to search all repositories for packages, install and upgrade packages / themes, plus more. Below describes all general CLI commands available.

list_packages

Description: Lists all packages available to the system from all repositories configured on the system.

Usage: ./apex list_packages

search TERM

Description Searches all repositories configured on the system for a specific search term.

Example: ./apex search mailing list

install PACKAGE1 PACKAGE2...

Description: Downloads a package from a repository, and installs it on the system. This command allows you to specify multiple packages at one time as well.

Example: ./apex install webapp users transaction support

upgrade [PACKAGE]

Description: Checks the repositories, and automatically downloads and installs any available upgrades. if desired, you may optionally specify a single package to upgrade. Otherwise, all installed packages will be upgraded. It's recommended to run this command about once a week to ensure your packages are always up to date.

Example: ./apex upgrade

check_upgrades [PACKAGE]

Description: Checks the repositories for any available upgrades, and provides information on the latest available version of each package. This does not download or install the upgrades, and instead only provides what upgrades are available.

Example: php check_upgrades

list_themes

Description: Lists all themes available from all repositories configured on this system.

Example: ./apex list_themes

install_theme THEME_ALIAS

Description: Downloads the specified theme from the repository, and installs it on the system.

Example: ./apex install_theme mydesign

change_theme AREA THEME_ALIAS

Description: Allows you to change the currently active theme on an area. The AREA should be either "public" or "members", and then the alias of the theme you would like to activate. The theme must already be installed on the system.

Example: ./apex change_theme public mydesign

Package / Upgrade Development

Various CLI commands are available allowing you to easily create, publish, and delete packages and upgrades within repositories. Below explains all CLI commands available for package / upgrade development.

create_package PACKAGE [REPO_ID]

Description: Creates a new package on the local system, which can then be developed, and later published to a repository. This creates the necessary directories within /etc/ and /src/, and upon creation, you can begin creting components on the package via the apex.php script.

Example: ./apex create_package casino

scan PACKAGE

Description: Scans the /etc/PACKAGE/package.php configuration file, and updates the database as needed. Use this during development, after you have updated the package.php file with new information such as config variables or menus, run this to reflect the changes within the database and system.

Example: ./apex scan casino

publish PACKAGE

Description: After developing a package, you may publish it to the repository using this command. This will compile the package, and upload it to the repository,. Once done, you can then begin installing the package on other systems via the install PACKAGE command.

Example: ./apex publish casino

delete_package PACKAGE

Description: Completely removes a package and all of its components from the system. Please note, this does not remove the package from any repositories it has been previously uploaded to, and only removes it from the local system.

Example: ./apex delete_package casino

create_upgrade PACKAGE [VERSION]

Description: Creates a new upgrade point on the specified package. You may optionally define a version for the upgrade, and if left unspecified, the system will simply increment the third element of the current version by one. This will basically create an "image" of the package by creating a SHA1 hash of every file, and upon publishing the package, these hashes will be checked allowing the system to determine all modifications made to the package since the upgrade point was created. This allows for virtually hands free version control.

Example: ./apex create_upgrade casino

publish_upgrade [PACKAGE]

Description: Once you've completed developing an upgrade after creating the upgrade point, you can upload it to the repository using this command. Once uploaded, all systems with the package installed can install the upgrade on their system with the apex.php upgrade command.

Example: ./apex publish_upgrade casino

create_theme THEME_ALIAS

Description: Creates a new theme, which can then later be published to a repository if desired. This creates the necessary directory structure within the /views/themes/ and /public/themes/ directories, from which you can begin creating the theme.

Example: ./apex create_theme mydesign

init_theme THEME_ALIAS

Description: After initially creating the theme, and once you have the base header.tpl, footer.tpl and /tpl/index.tpl files in place, run this command to help initialize the theme and speed up integration. This command will go through the .tpl files of the theme, and update the internal links to javascript / CSS / images as necessary with the ~theme_uri~ tag, helping speed up the integration process.

Example: ./apex init_theme mydesign

publish_theme THEME_ALIAS

Description: Will publish the specified theme to the repository. Once published, it can be installed on any system with the apex.php install_theme THEME_ALIAS command.

Example: ./apex publish_theme mydesign

delete_theme THEME_ALIAS

Description: Deletes the specified theme from the system, including all files and directories. Please note, this only deletes the theme from your local system, and not any repositories.

Example: ./apex delete_theme mydesign

Component Development

There are a couple commands you will be using very frequently during development to create and delete components, which are explained below. Always ensure to create all components via the apex.php script, and NEVER manually create the files as they will not get registered to the package for publication. For details on all components supported by Apex, please visit List of Components.

create TYPE PACKAGE:[PARENT:]ALIAS [OWNER]

Description: Creates a new component on the system. Creating new components must adhere to the following rules:

• The TYPE variable is the type of the component, and must be one of the following:

  • ajax
  • autosuggest
  • cli
  • controller
  • cron
  • form
  • htmlfunc
  • lib
  • modal
  • tabcontrol
  • tabpage
  • table
  • test
  • view
  • worker
• The PARENT variable is only required for the component types of controller and tabpage. For "tabpage" components, naturally this needs to be the alias of the tab control to place the new tab page into. For the type "controller", this can be left blank, and it will create a new controller parent (eg. directory within /src/PACKAGE/controller/), otherwise is the parent controller to place the new controller into.
• The OWNER variable is required for the types "controller", "tabpage", and "view". This is the package who owns the component, as these components can and will end up in a different pacakges /src/ directory. Upon publishing, this component will be included in the OWNER package.
• The OWNER variable is also required for the "worker" component type, but instead of being the owner package, is the routing key for the worker. This defines which messages to route to the worker. For more information, please visit the worker Component page of this manual.
• For the "view" component type, the PACKAGE:PARENT:ALIAS element of the command is simply the URI of the new template (eg. admin/users/some_page)

Example (lib: ./apex create lib casino:games

Example (view: ./apex create view admin/games/bets casino

Example (worker): ./apex create worker casino:user users.user

Example (controller): ./apex create controller core:http_requests:games casino

delete TYPE PACKAGE:[PARENT:]ALIAS

Description: Deletes a component from the system. The two variables passed are the exact same as the create command above. This will permanently remove the component from the filesystem and database.

Example (lib): ./apex delete lib casino:games

Example (view): ./apex delete view admin/casino/bets

Example (controller): ./apex delete controller core:http_requests:games

scan PACKAGE

Description: Scans the /etc/PACKAGE/packge.php configuration file, and updates the database as needed. Use this during development, after you have updated the package.php file with new information such as config variables or menus, run this to reflect the changes within the database and system.

Example: ./apex scan casino

System Maintenance

There are several CLI commands available for general system maintenance, such as addinf / updating repositories, updating connection information for both mySQL master database and RabbitMQ, and more. Below explains all system maintenance commands available.

add_repo HOSTNAME [USERNAME] [PASSWORD]

Description: Adds a new repository to the system, which is then checked for available packages, themes and upgrades. The HOSTNAME is the base hostname of the repository, and you may optionally specify a username and password in case of a private repository, which will be provided to you by the owner of the repository.

Example: ./apex add_repo repo.somevendor.com myuser mypassword

update_repo HOSTNAME [USERNAME] [PASSWORD]

Description: Allows you to update an existing repository already in the system with a username and password. Specify the hostname of the repo, and assuming it is already configured on the system, you will be prompted for a username and password, which will be provided to you by the owner of the repository. This is to gain access to any private packages you may have purchased.

Example: ./apex update_repo repo.somevendor.com

mode [DEVEL|PROD] [DEBUG_LEVEL]

Description: Changes the server mode between either development or products, and allows you to change the debug level between 0 -5.

Example: ./apex mode devel 4

debug NUM

Description: Specifies whether or not to save debugging information for the next requests, which can then be viewed through the Dev Kit->Debugger menu of the administration panel. The value passed must be one of the following:

• 0 - Debugging off
• 1 - Debugging on, but only for next request
• 2 - Debugging on for all future requests until turned off

Example: ./apex debug 1

server_type TYPE

Description: Changes the server type of the installation. The TYPE must be one of the following: all, web, app, dbm, dbs, msg.

Example: ./apex server_type web

update_masterdb

Description:Allows you to update connection information for the master mySQL database. Useful if the database information has changed, as upon that happening, you will no longer be able to access the software and this information is stored within redis versus a plain text file.

Example: ./apex update_masterdb

clear_dbslaves

Description: Clears all slave database servers from redis, and begins only connecting to the master mySQL database. This is useful if connection information on one or more slaves has changed without first being updated in the software, as it will result in various connection errors by the software. Please note, upon clearing the slave database servers, you must enter the necessary slaves again via the Settings->General menu of the administration panel.

Example: ./apex clear_dbslaves

update_rabbitmq

Description: Allows you to update the connection information for RabbitMQ. Useful if your connection information has changed, as it may result in the software throwing errors, and the RabbitMQ connection information is stored within redis versus a plain text file.

compile_core

Description: Should never be needed, and compiles the core Apex framework for the Github repository. Places the Github repo of Apex within the system /tmp/ directory.

Example: ./apex compile_core

NOTE: For full details, please visit the Github Integration page of the documentation.

git_init PACKAGE

Description: Used to initialize a package and ready it for publishing to Github. This will create a sub-directory at /src/package_alias/git/ if one doesn't already exist, then copy over all package files into it, plus create a git.sh file, readying it for a push to github.

Example: ./apex git_init mypackage

git_compare PACKAGE

Description: Used to compare the current filesystem to the Github repository, and create the necessary git.sh file ensuring the Github repo is running the latest version of the code base. This command assumes the local filesystem is more up to date than the Github repository.

Example: ./apex git_compare PACKAGE

git_sync PACKAGE

Description: Used to sync the contents of the Github repository with the local filesystem. This assumes the Github repo is more up to date than the local filesystem, will download the repository tabball, and replace any updated files with those on the local filesystem.

Example: ./apex git_sync PACKAGE