QST Docker

QST (Quiz/Survey/Test) in a Docker container.

Usage

docker-compose.yml:

version: '3'
services:
  app:
    container_name: qst
    image: elquimista/qst:3.11.01
    restart: unless-stopped
    depends_on:
      - db
    environment:
      - DB_HOST=db
      - DB_ROOT_PASSWORD=Qst#captain2root
      - DB_USER=qst
      - DB_PASSWORD=Qst#captain2
      - DB_DATABASE=qst
    volumes:
      - ./qst_files:/var/www/qst/schools/qst_files
    ports:
      - 127.0.0.1:8080:80

  db:
    image: mysql:8.2.0
    restart: unless-stopped
    environment:
      - MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=Qst#captain2root
      - MYSQL_USER=qst
      - MYSQL_PASSWORD=Qst#captain2
      - MYSQL_DATABASE=qst
    volumes:
      - ./db_data:/var/lib/mysql

Start the container and initialize the database schema:

docker-compose up -d
docker-compose exec app init-db

Now QST is accessible at http://localhost:8080.

If you want to start a new container completely from scratch and want to retain the existing database, this Docker image has two commands available:

docker exec qst dump-db > qst.sql
docker exec -i qst restore-db -t < qst.sql

Run dump-db command before deleting database container (e.g., before running docker-compose down). Similarly, run restore-db command after running docker-compose up -d.

You might wonder why these extra commands are needed when we can simply reuse Docker volume (db_data folder as shown in the sample docker-compose.yml). Good question! I tried it and it doesn't work unfortunately in this specific case. Perl's DBI module (or could it be Apache?) complaints about some secure connection error and I couldn't figure it out why. So the above approach is more like a workaround for now. Exact error message says:

DBI connect (...) failed: Authentication plugin 'caching_sha2_password' reported error: Authentication requires secure connection. at /home/MyApache2/QST.pm line 67.

Development

Upgrading QST version

Download qst_linux_mac.zip from QST's canonical repository, unzip it and replace it with qst_linux folder in this git repository.

Change the hardcoded database connection details as follows:

startup.pl:

Apache::DBI->connect_on_init
 ("DBI:mysql:$ENV{DB_NAME}:$ENV{DB_HOST}",
   $ENV{DB_USER},
   $ENV{DB_PASSWORD},
   {
    ...

QST.pm:

my $dbh = DBI->connect("DBI:mysql:database=$ENV{DB_NAME};host=$ENV{DB_HOST}",$ENV{DB_USER}, $ENV{DB_PASSWORD},{RaiseError => 0,PrintError => 1,AutoCommit => 1});

And then build a new Docker image:

docker-compose build
docker tag qst-app:latest elquimista/qst:<new_version>
docker push elquimista/qst:<new_version>