Getting Started with IBM Cloud

This tutorial demonstrates how to deploy a simple Node.js app to IBM Cloud. The app you are going to deploy is a server-side app that responds to HTTP GET requests and returns a simple text message Hello World!

Preparation

1. Create a free account at https://cloud.ibm.com. Write down your ID and password.

2. Download the sample app to your home directory.

cd ~
git clone https://github.com/leungmanfai/ibmcloud

3. It is always a good idea to verify that the app is working fine in your local machine before deploying it to the cloud.

Go into the folder containing the server-side app.

cd ~/ibmcloud/helloworld

Install the app's dependencies.

npm install

Run the server app.

npm start

4. Test your app by sending to it a HTTP GET request. Open http://127.0.0.1:8099 in your web browser.
5. Stop your app by pressing Ctrl-C in your terminal.

Deploy to IBM Cloud

1. Make sure you are inside the folder containing the app. Remove the app's dependencies (the node_modules folder).

cd ~/ibmcloud/helloworld
rm -rf node_modules

2. Login to IBM cloud. Enter your ID and password when prompted. When prompted to Select a region, selet us-south

bx login
bx target --cf

3. Deploy (upload) your app to IBM Cloud You need to find a unique name for your app. Apps on IBM Cloud are named XXXXXXXX.mybluemix.net where XXXXXXXX is the name of your app. I use rs202009011306 as the name of my app in this tutorial. If the deployment is successful, you will be able to see your app running at http://rs202009011306.mybluemix.net.

bx cf push -m 64m rs202009011306

It takes 3-4 minutes to upload the source code, provision and activate for your app in the cloud. If things go well, you will see the following messages at the end of deployment.

Waiting for app to start...

name:              rs202009011306
requested state:   started
routes:            rs202009011306.mybluemix.net
last uploaded:     Tue 01 Sep 15:06:50 CST 2020
stack:             cflinuxfs3
buildpacks:        sdk-for-nodejs

type:            web
instances:       1/1
memory usage:    64M
start command:   npm start
     state     since                  cpu    memory         disk          details
#0   running   2020-09-01T07:07:13Z   0.0%   45.7M of 64M   85.3M of 1G   

5. Test your app. Open the URL shown in routes above in your web broswer. In this tutorial, the URL is http://rs202009011306.mybluemix.net.

Other Useful Commands

1. To redeploy an app. Let's say we made some changes to rs202009011306 and we want to redeploy it.

bx cf push -m 64m rs202009011306

2. To see a list of apps that you have deployed to IBM Cloud

bx cf apps

This command returns a list of apps that are running in IBM Cloud

Invoking 'cf apps'...

Getting apps in org [email protected] / space dev as [email protected]...
OK

name             requested state   instances   memory   disk   urls
rs202009011306   started           1/1         64M      1G     rs202009011306.mybluemix.net

3. To delete rs202009011306 in IBM cloud.

bx cf delete rs202009011306

Type yes when prompted to confirm delete.

Invoking 'cf delete rs202009011306'...


Really delete the app rs202009011306?> yes
Deleting app rs202009011306 in org [email protected] / space dev as [email protected]...
OK

What's Next?

Follow the instructions to deploy express-weather to IBM Cloud.

ibmcloud