Deploy a fullstack app in the cloud using GCP - part 3

Step 3 - Move the backend to the cloud

Now that your backend is running locally and consumes your online MongoDB instance, it's time to move your app to GCP.

Create a google account with billing activated

No stress ! You need a credit card to activate the billing, but google gives a 300$ credit for free, and you have 1 year to consume it.

If you do only tests, not production, it's free for 1 year. 

• Go to https://console.cloud.google.com/ and login with your google account

• Click on the "Activate" Button on the top-right corner, and follow the assistant. You need to enter your card number, but you won't be charged without giving your authorization.

Create a project for the backend

• In the nav bar, click "Select a project', and 'New project' in the popup

• Then enter the name of yout project in the text box.
• I recommand to modify the ID of the project, because the ID will be part of the URL. It will make your URL smarter.
• To do this, click "Modify" button

• Wait for the project to be created
• Go to your new project (nav bar "Select project")
• Activate appengine. On the right side, click "App Engine"
• Click "Create an application", and select your region.
• Then select :

• Language : Java
• Environment : Standard 

Note :

It is a way to create the project directly from the gcloud command (without using the GCP console). Unfortunatly, when I try this, there are network issues with the MongoDB. If anybody has any clue about that, please leave a comment !

Install the gcloud SDK

• Click the "Download SDK" button and follow the instructions.

For the first time (you never deployed the app, and never created the configuration)

• Create a new gcloud configuration for the back 

gcloud config configurations create back

• If you are behind a corporate proxy 

gcloud config set proxy/address [address_of_your_proxy]

gcloud config set proxy/port [port_of_youor_proxy]

gcloud config set proxy/type http

• Then 

$ gcloud components install app-engine-java

$ gcloud init

• Choose 1 - Re-initialize configuration
• Then choose your google account (or login with a new account)
• Select the project you created at the previous step
• The project name will be part of the URL, select an appropriate name

Or, if the configuration "back" already exists

gcloud config configurations activate back

Deploy the application

• Just do the following command :

./mvnw -DskipTests appengine:deploy

• At the end, the public URL of your app is displayed :

[INFO] GCLOUD: Deployed service [default] to [https://xxx_yourappname.appspot.com]

Test the app online

• As in local, you can use Postman to test.
• If you are behing a proxy, do not forget to adjust the postman settings.

• Take your local testsuite, change the URL from http://localhost:8080 by https://xxx_yourappname.appspot.com, as displayed by the Maven build (previous step).
• Great, now your backend is up and running in the cloud. Next step : build the frontend locally !