January 2018 Summaries

Strapi is a Node.js Content Management Framework designed to create APIs in seconds, offering features like an Admin Panel, Authentication & Permissions management, and Content Management. To deploy a Strapi project for production on a clean Ubuntu server, developers need to install Node.js, MongoDB, and the necessary dependencies. They also need to configure the firewall rules and set up a reverse proxy using nginx. The process manager PM2 is used to ensure the app restarts automatically in case of crashes. After completing these steps, the Strapi API becomes accessible at `http://yourIP:1337`.

Strapi [email protected] introduces significant updates, primarily focused on fixing bugs related to admin deployment and permissions management, following user feedback from the previous Alpha.7 release. The update simplifies the admin build workflow, enhancing the deployment process and allowing the admin front-end to be hosted on a separate server, thereby increasing flexibility. Users are encouraged to migrate from [email protected] to [email protected] using the detailed migration guide provided, with additional incentives like a t-shirt giveaway for retweeting the latest announcement. Looking ahead, [email protected] is in development, promising improvements to the Users & Permissions plugin, including support for authentication via social media platforms and customizable email templates. Pierre, one of the co-founders of Strapi, emphasizes the platform's open-source nature and the community-driven approach to its development.

Creating a private npm registry for testing packages can help ensure they function correctly before official release, which is crucial since packages can behave differently across environments. Strapi faced such challenges and addressed them by setting up a private npm local registry using Verdaccio and ngrok, allowing them to test packages on a server prior to npm release. This guide details how to establish a private npm repository server with Verdaccio, configure it as the default registry, and create and publish a simple package to the local registry. The guide further explains how to share this registry with collaborators using ngrok, enabling testing on multiple machines, and emphasizes the importance of this practice by describing Strapi's approach of testing packages in real production environments before official publication.