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🏁 Full Flight Plan: From New to Kube

This guide walks you through the complete LaraKube CLI journey: from scaffolding a new masterpiece on your laptop to a professional, automated GitOps deployment in the cloud.

🏎️ Phase 1: Local Launch​

Start by creating your application with the LaraKube CLI.

# 1. Scaffold your project
larakube new my-masterpiece --fast

# 2. Enter the directory
cd my-masterpiece

# 3. Launch your local cluster
larakube up

Your app is now running at https://my-masterpiece.kube with perfect production parity.

🛠️ Phase 2: Cloud Provisioning​

Now, let's prepare your Linux VPS (Single-Node Hero) for its first deployment.

# 1. Point your domain (e.g., app.larakube.com) to your VPS IP address.

# 2. Hardening and K3s installation
larakube cloud:provision

Follow the prompts to enter your Server IP, SSH credentials, and email for Let'sEncrypt. This command will also set up a 1GB Swap file for stability.

⚙️ Phase 3: Cloud Configuration​

Connect your local code to your remote server and configure your GitOps pipeline.

# 1. Link your project to the remote server (IP/SSH + web host)
larakube cloud:configure:base

# 2. Set up GitHub Actions CI/CD
larakube cloud:configure:gha

Or run larakube cloud:configure (no suffix) for the guided flow that walks through the server, an optional shared Commons, and CI in one go.

What's happening here:​

  • The base configuration records your server connection (IP/SSH or managed context) and the real web domain into .larakube.json.
  • The GHA configuration encodes your secrets, extracts your minified Kubeconfig, and generates a hardened .github/workflows/larakube-deploy-production.yml file.

🚀 Phase 4: Final Departure (Git Push)​

You're cleared for takeoff. Deploy your masterpiece by simply pushing your code to GitHub.

# 1. Add and commit your changes
git add .
git commit -m "🚀 Initial LaraKube CLI Cloud Pilot deployment"

# 2. Push to your trigger branch (e.g., main)
git push origin main

🔭 Mission Control​

Head over to your GitHub Actions tab to watch the build. Once complete, your application will be live at your production domain with automated SSL!

🏆 Summary​

You've just completed a professional Kubernetes deployment workflow:

  1. Local Dev: Perfect parity with K3d.
  2. Hardening: VPS secured and stabilized with Swap.
  3. GitOps: Fully automated pipeline with GHCR.
  4. Scaling Ready: You can now scale horizontally or "graduate" to multi-node managed K8s without changing your .larakube.json blueprint.

🏘️ Going Further: Share a Commons (Plex)​

Running a second app on the same box? You don't need a duplicate Postgres/Redis/S3 stack. Plex lets multiple apps share one Commons — a database (Postgres/MySQL/MariaDB), Redis, Meilisearch, and S3 (SeaweedFS/MinIO) — each app fully isolated with its own database, login, and bucket:

larakube plex:init             # stand up (or extend) the shared Commons on the cluster
larakube plex:join production  # join this app — provisions its isolated DB + bucket
larakube plex:status           # inspect the Commons and its tenants

See Two Apps, One Server → Plex for the full walkthrough.

note

Plex is validated on a single-node VPS via both the manual deploy and the GitHub Actions flow above — apps sharing a Commons deploy cleanly either way. Running the Commons across a multi-node cluster (DOKS) isn't validated yet. (Tracking on the roadmap.)