XC_VM/docs/en/guides/dev-workflow.md

Development Workflow

How to set up the project locally, run the quality checks, and deploy code to a development server.

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Local Setup

Prerequisites: PHP 8.1 (the codebase pins php: 8.1.33; newer majors are not supported) and Composer available locally.

The committed src/vendor/ is production-only, so the dev tools (PHPStan, phpcs) are not in the tree. Install them once from the committed lock:

make dev-tools          # = cd src && composer install

This adds the require-dev packages into src/vendor/. Never commit them — the committed vendor must stay production-only (composer install --no-dev). .gitignore keeps the dev packages out of git add, and a CI gate (check-vendor-prod-only) fails the build if one is ever committed.

Quality Checks

Run these before pushing — CI runs the same set:

Command	Checks
make phpstan	Static analysis against the committed baseline (fails only on NEW issues)
make cs	Code style — import/namespace hygiene (phpcs + Slevomat)
make cs-fix	Apply the style fixes in place
make gates	PSR-4 regression gates (below)
php tests/phpunit.phar -c tests/phpunit.xml.dist	Unit tests — see PHPUnit Setup
make e2e	Browser tests against a live test panel — see End-to-End Tests
make rector	Dry-run automated refactoring — see Automated Refactoring (Rector)

make phpstan and make cs need the dev tools — run make dev-tools first.

The PHPStan baseline lives at build/phpstan-baseline.neon — it freezes all pre-existing issues so only new ones fail CI. If you intentionally change the level or accept a batch of findings, regenerate it with make phpstan-baseline and commit the result. Don't regenerate it just to silence a real new error — fix the code.

make gates bundles three guards:

• check-procedural-use — procedural / view files import every migrated class they use (PHP imports are positional, so the use must precede the usage);
• verify-lb-archive — the Load Balancer build excludes privileged code (admin/reseller controllers, user/device domain, install/root commands) — see Build System (MAIN vs LB) for the exclusion boundary;
• check-vendor-prod-only — no require-dev package is committed under src/vendor/.

End-to-End Tests

tests/e2e is a Playwright suite that drives the admin panel the way an administrator does: it creates categories, bouquets, packages, lines, devices, resellers, block-list entries and a live stream, edits them, starts and stops the stream, and deletes everything again. It needs a test panel (never production) and an admin account used only by the tests — every admin login re-hashes the password and signs out that account's other sessions.

Set XC_E2E_BASE_URL (the admin URL including the access code), XC_E2E_USER and XC_E2E_PASS, then run make e2e-install once and make e2e. The suite's README.md (in tests/e2e/) lists what each spec covers, how to provision the test account with tests/e2e/tools/create-admin.php, and what the tests change on the panel host.

Deploying Code to VDS via SFTP

For daily development, we recommend the SFTP extension for VS Code — edit locally, auto-upload on save.

Setup

Create .vscode/sftp.json:

[
    {
        "name": "My Dev VDS",
        "host": "YOUR_VDS_IP",
        "protocol": "sftp",
        "port": 22,
        "username": "root",
        "remotePath": "/home/xc_vm",
        "useTempFile": false,
        "uploadOnSave": true,
        "openSsh": false,
        "watcher": {
            "files": "**/*",
            "autoUpload": false,
            "autoDelete": true
        },
        "ignore": [
            ".vscode",
            ".git",
            ".gitattributes",
            ".gitignore",
            "update",
            "*pycache/",
            "*.gitkeep",
            "bin/",
            "config/",
            "tmp/"
        ],
        "context": "./src/",
        "profiles": {}
    },
    {
        "name": "My Dev VDS Tests",
        "host": "YOUR_VDS_IP",
        "protocol": "sftp",
        "port": 22,
        "username": "root",
        "remotePath": "/home/xc_vm/tests",
        "useTempFile": false,
        "uploadOnSave": true,
        "openSsh": false,
        "watcher": {
            "files": "**/*",
            "autoUpload": false,
            "autoDelete": true
        },
        "ignore": [
            ".vscode",
            ".git",
            ".gitattributes",
            ".gitignore",
            "tmp/",
            ".cache/"
        ],
        "context": "./tests/",
        "profiles": {}
    }
]

Key Settings

• context: "./src/" — maps local src/ to remote /home/xc_vm/
• context: "./tests/" — maps local tests/ to remote /home/xc_vm/tests/
• uploadOnSave: true — every Ctrl+S pushes the file to VDS instantly
• ignore — protects server-specific files (bin/, config/, tmp/)

⚠️ watcher.autoDelete: true — deleting a file locally deletes it on the VDS too. Handy for keeping the tree in sync, but a mis-deleted local file (or a bad rename) will remove the remote copy. Keep the ignore list tight, or set it to false if you don't want the watcher to propagate deletions.

Security: Use SSH keys instead of password. The .vscode/ directory is in .gitignore, so credentials won't leak to git.

How to sync the tests folder

1. Add a second SFTP entry with context: "./tests/" and remotePath: "/home/xc_vm/tests".
2. Save files under tests/ locally.
3. The extension will upload them separately from src/ into /home/xc_vm/tests.
4. This is required because tests are stored outside src/ and will not be uploaded by the main entry.

Workflow

1. Open project in VS Code
2. Edit any file under src/
3. If you add a test, edit the file under tests/
4. Save — the matching SFTP entry uploads the file to VDS
5. Run the relevant test on VDS
6. Commit to git as usual

Related files

File	Role
.vscode/sftp.json	Local → VDS sync config (gitignored)
Makefile	make dev-tools, make phpstan, make cs, make gates
src/composer.json	Dependencies + PSR-4 autoload