Developer mode

Developer mode supports an active development environment with full, writable filesystem permissions. This option builds the Docker environment in developer mode and verifies configured service versions. On macOS and Windows systems, performance is slower in developer mode because of additional file synchronization operations. However, you can improve performance by using either mutagen or docker-sync file synchronization tools when you generate the docker-compose.yml configuration file. See Synchronizing data in Docker.

The ece-tools version 2002.0.18 and later supports developer mode.

Large files (>1 GB) can cause a period of inactivity. DB dumps and archive files—ZIP, SQL, GZ, and BZ2—are not necessary to sync. You can find exclusions to these file types in the docker-sync.yml and mutagen.sh files.

See Configure Docker for additional information about Docker prerequisites and using the Magento Cloud Docker environment.

To launch the Docker environment in developer mode:

1. Download a Magento application template from the Magento Cloud repository. Be careful to select the branch that corresponds with the Magento version.

2. Add your Magento access credentials to the auth.json file.

3. Install the template dependencies.

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   composer install
   

4. On macOS or Windows hosts, install the selected file synchronization tool:

   • Docker-sync Installation instructions
   • Mutagen.io Installation instructions

5. In your local environment, generate the Docker Compose configuration file. You can use the service keys, such as --php, to specify a version.

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   ./vendor/bin/ece-docker build:compose --mode="developer"
   

   If required, set the option for synchronizing data in Docker. For example:

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   ./vendor/bin/ece-docker build:compose --mode="developer" --sync-engine="mutagen"
   

6. Optional: If you have a custom PHP configuration file, copy the default configuration DIST file to your custom configuration file and make any necessary changes.

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   cp .docker/config.php.dist .docker/config.php
   

7. Optional: Configure the Docker global variables in the docker-compose.yml file. For example, you can enable Xdebug in the .magento.app.yaml file, and then update the configuration in the docker-compose.yml file. See Configure Xdebug for Docker.

8. If you selected docker-sync for file synchronization, start the file synchronization.

   For the docker-sync tool:

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   docker-sync start
   

   If this is the first installation, expect to wait a few minutes for file synchronization.

9. Build files to containers and run in the background.

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   docker-compose up -d
   

10. If you selected mutagen for file synchronization, start the file synchronization.

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    bash ./mutagen.sh
    

    If you host your Docker environment on Windows and the session start fails, update the mutagen.sh file to change the value for the --symlink-mode option to portable.

11. Install Magento in your Docker environment.

    • Deploy Magento in the Docker container.

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      docker-compose run deploy cloud-deploy
      

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      docker-compose run deploy magento-command deploy:mode:set developer
      

    • Run post-deploy hooks.

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       docker-compose run deploy cloud-post-deploy
      

      Developer mode does not require the build operation.

12. Configure and connect Varnish.

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    docker-compose run deploy magento-command config:set system/full_page_cache/caching_application 2 --lock-env
    

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    docker-compose run deploy magento-command setup:config:set --http-cache-hosts=varnish
    

13. Clear the cache.

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    docker-compose run deploy magento-command cache:clean
    

14. Access the local Magento Cloud template by opening one of the following URLs in a browser:

    • http://magento2.docker

    • https://magento2.docker