Tag Archives: VIP CLI

VIP CLI: Improvements to the Media Import tool

We’re pleased to announce a feature enhancement driven by customer feedback, which will allow you to move faster, by importing a larger media file archive in one go.

Going forward, the maximum size of media files archive that you can import with the vip import media command has been raised to 200 GB. This is an increase from the 60 GB limit that was in place prior to this.

You can read more about importing media into your environments over at our documentation.

If you have any questions, feel free to reach out, and we will be happy to help.

New Release: VIP-CLI 2.32.1

VIP-CLI 2.32.1 is now available.

v2.32.1 contains a hotfix for an issue that may prevent VIP Local Development instances from starting up after updating to Docker Desktop v 4.21.0 / Docker Compose v2.19.0.

v2.32.0 contains the following features/improvements:

Export database backups generated on-demand.
Improvements in the help text for several subcommands.

Please run npm i -g @automattic/vip to get the latest improvements. You can find the detailed installation / update instructions on WordPress VIP Documentation site.

If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out, and we will be happy to help.

Feature Update: Export database backups generated on-demand

We’re thrilled to announce that we have expanded our VIP-CLI dev-env export sql command to include an option to generate a new backup and export it. This new feature is a step towards ensuring that you have access to the latest data of your application.

vip export sql @<your-application-id>.<environment-name> --generate-backup

The --generate-backup command option triggers the creation of a new database backup before the CLI downloads it onto your machine. If this option is not used, the database backup for your environment which was last generated by our systems will be downloaded (which is also the default behaviour of this command).

Here is an example of the new command option:

vip @0000.production export sql --generate-backup

NOTICE: A new database backup will only be generated for this environment if a recent backup does not already exist. Learn more about this: https://docs.wpvip.com/technical-references/vip-dashboard/backups/#0-limitations

Creating a new database backup...
✓ Preparing
✓ Generating backup
New database backup created
✓ Preparing
✓ Creating backup copy
✓ Requesting download link
✓ Downloading file - 100.00% (39.57 KB/39.57 KB)
File saved to /Users/home/2023-06-21T1404UTC-environment.go-vip.net-abcdefghijkl-db-backup.sql.gz

Please note that this feature has rate limits associated with it. Please take a look at the related documentation for more details on this.

To use this feature, please run npm install -g @automattic/vip to get the latest version of VIP-CLI. Verify that your VIP-CLI installation is on version 2.32.0 or above, by running vip --version from the terminal. You can learn more about this feature from our documentation.

We would love to know what you think. How do you hope to use these new tools? What could be added to improve your experience? Feel free to get in touch!

New Features: Simplified Database Export & Synchronization with Local Environment

We’re excited to release two new VIP-CLI commands that will help developers export and import a database backup into their local environment in a single step. The new commands will improve developer productivity and reduce errors coming from importing a database backup into a local development environment. This is a large improvement over the current multi-step process

New export command

We are adding the ability to export database contents of a site from VIP-CLI with a single command:

vip export sql @<your-site-id>.<environment-name> –output=<output-file>

This command automatically detects the latest backup of a site, prepares SQL export, and downloads the file as specified with the –output option. If this option is not specified, it downloads in the user’s current working directory.

$ vip export sql @0000.production --output /home/user/exported.sql.gz
Fetching the latest backup for mytestsite
✓ Latest backup found with timestamp 2023-05-30T08:16:09.000Z
Creating a new export for the backup with timestamp 2023-05-30T08:16:09.000Z
✓ Preparing 
✓ Creating backup copy 
✓ Requesting download link 
✓ Downloading file
File saved to /home/user/exported.sql.gz

Please note that this command does not let you select any specific backup, tables or network sites. We will iteratively add features to it, and for now it can only export the latest backup, all tables and all network sites.

New sync command

To try this feature, ensure that you’re on the latest version of VIP-CLI and simply run the following in your terminal:

vip dev-env sync sql --slug=<your-local-env-slug> @<your-site-id>.<environment-name>

Depending on the size of the database backup, this command may take a bit of time to finish. A successful attempt should look like the following:

$ vip dev-env sync sql --slug=0000-production @0000.production
Fetching the latest backup for mytestsite
✓ Latest backup found with timestamp 2023-05-30T12:43:07.000Z
Creating a new export for the backup with timestamp 2023-05-30T12:43:07.000Z
✓ Preparing 
✓ Creating backup copy 
✓ Requesting download link 
✓ Downloading file - 100.00% (37.01 KB/37.01 KB)
File saved to /tmp/vip-cli-YrjINx/sql-export.sql.gz
Extracting the exported file /tmp/vip-cli-YrjINx/sql-export.sql.gz...
✓ Extracted to /tmp/vip-cli-YrjINx/sql-export.sql
Extracting site urls from the SQL file...
Running the following search-replace operations on the SQL file:
  //mytestsite.go-vip.net -> //0000-production.vipdev.lndo.site
✓ Search-replace operation is complete
Importing the SQL file...
Success: The cache was flushed.
Success: Created user 3.
Success: User "vipgo" created.
✓ SQL file imported

Please note that this does not yet have full parity with the feature on the VIP Dashboard. We currently support only importing the latest backup of the entire database, and only single site installations.

To use this feature, please run npm install -g @automattic/vip to get the latest version of VIP-CLI. Please also verify that your VIP-CLI installation is on version 2.30.0 or above, by running vip --version from the terminal.

We would love to know what you think. How do you hope to use these new tools? What could be added to improve your experience? Feel free to get in touch!

New Release: VIP CLI 2.9.5

The VIP CLI version 2.9.5 has been released. This release covers the following changes:

VIP dev-environment
- When the user starts a dev environment with: vip dev-env start , with a WordPress version that is not the most up-to-date, the prompt for upgrading will include the option for “don’t ask again”.
- During the sequence of: vip dev-env create , the user will be given the option to include or exclude components such as: enterprise search, Xdebug, and PHPMyadmin. This has the effect of making the dev-env less resource intensive for those who don’t need to use those components.
- The option, for users to select a PHP version, has been added also to the vip dev-env create sequence. Users can now select between PHP: 7.4, 8.0, 8.1, or select the “default” option, which will be the current PHP version of the platform.
General use
- We have made the WP-CLI integration more reliable for long-running commands.

Users can update to the new version, with the following command:

npm update -g @automattic/vip

If you have any questions, related to this release, please open a support ticket and we will be happy to assist.

New Feature: Live Updates for Runtime Logs

Runtime Logs now supports live updates; new log entries are automatically fetched for you!

An animation showing live updates for Runtime Logs.

We announced the availability of Runtime Logs two weeks ago. Using the vip logs VIP-CLI command, you can get a view into recent application logs generated by your WordPress and Node applications running on WordPress VIP.

With our latest release (VIP-CLI 2.8.1), you can now pass the --follow param to trigger live updates:

$ vip @123.production logs --follow

Sometimes referred to as “log tailing” or “follow mode”, this feature will automatically fetch new log entries from your applications at a set interval (currently every 30 seconds) without having to re-run the command multiple times.

Note: You’ll need VIP-CLI 2.8.1 or higher to use the new --follow param (how to update VIP-CLI).

You can also learn more about the flag in our Runtime Logs documentation.

Next up, we’ll be adding Runtime Logs to the VIP Dashboard, so you can choose how you want to access your application logs.

We’d love to know what you think including how you hope to use this feature (and what we’re missing); please get in touch!

New Release: VIP-CLI 2.7.1

Our VIP-CLI NPM package has been updated to version 2.7.1, we strongly recommend that all customers ensure they update to this version.

This version of VIP-CLI fixes an issue that caused an infinite loop when running certain commands due to changes in a 3rd-party dependency.

If you already have VIP-CLI installed you can update with: npm i -g @automattic/vip

If you have any questions, related to this release, please open a support ticket and we will be happy to assist.

Platform and Tooling Updates: VIP-CLI, Enterprise Search, and Content Distribution

This week, we’re announcing new self-service import capabilities, developer tools for Enterprise Search, and a change to content privacy on non-production sites. Read on for the latest updates to the VIP platform:

New VIP-CLI Release

A new release of VIP-CLI, 2.0.8 is now available.

We’ve added a beta edition of our new self-service media import tool, allowing you to bulk-import images to your WordPress applications and expanded availability of our SQL import self-service tooling, which is now available for both launched and unlaunched sites, making it easier to prepare your content for launch.

You can view more changes in the full changelog on GitHub.

How do I update?

To get this update, you can run the following:

npm install -g @automattic/vip

If you haven’t previously used VIP-CLI, you can start with our installation instructions.

Enterprise Search Service

VIP’s Enterprise Search service is now available, including Search Developer Tools that allow you to test search queries and confirm results.

Enterprise Search is an out-of-the-box search configuration designed from the ground up to meet enterprise scale. Powered by Elasticsearch and our globally distributed network, Enterprise Search is a stable, secure, and performant search solution that brings the power of the Elasticsearch to the enterprise WordPress context, allowing our customers to provide modern, fast search experiences as well as a performance-enhancing layer to existing WordPress searches and queries.

Jetpack Content Distribution Set to Private on Non-Production Sites by Default

As of today, all non-production sites are set to private Jetpack connections by default, preventing non-production site content from being accidentally indexed and searchable online. These settings can be controlled by setting a constant in your code – read more about Jetpack content distribution.

We’re hard at work on further improvements and hope to have more soon. In the meantime, if you’d like to discuss your VIP developer experience or want to help test upcoming releases, please get in touch.

New Release: VIP-CLI 2.0

We’re excited to announce the release of VIP-CLI v2.0. The headline feature for this release is the new SQL Import command, which allows you to perform self-service imports of SQL databases to unlaunched sites.

This new SQL Import command allows you to import data to your VIP apps on your own schedule, allowing for faster and more flexible launching of new apps.

Future releases will support self-service importing of SQL databases to launched, multisite instances, as well as self-service media library imports. You can read more about migrating content to WordPress VIP in our documentation.

The VIP-CLI is a tool for developers to interact with applications hosted on the VIP Go platform via the command line. This release also deprecates support for Node 8.0, which has reached end of life.

You can view more changes in the full changelog on GitHub.

How do I update?

To get this update, you can run the following:

npm install -g @automattic/vip

If you haven’t previously used VIP-CLI, you can start with our installation instructions.

New Release: VIP-CLI 1.12

We’re excited to announce the release of VIP-CLI v1.12.

The VIP-CLI is a tool for developers to interact with applications hosted on the VIP Go platform via the command line.

The 1.12 update includes tooling that can help validate a SQL and media import to help determine whether it’s ready to be migrated to the VIP platform:

The vip import validate-sql command will check a static SQL dump for the basic requirements on the valid import checklist.

The vip import validate-files command will check a media archive to see if its folders are in the required or recommended structure for the import into the VIP Platform.

You can view more changes in the full changelog on GitHub.

How do I update?

To get this update, you can run the following:

npm install -g @automattic/vip

If you haven’t previously used VIP-CLI, you can start with our installation instructions.