The cemetery-map Web application is a responsive Python+Flask+SQLAlchemy+Google Maps app that allows people to search for loved ones in a cemetery. This application is a Flask rewrite of a previous Node.js app written by jbshep and his students, which was designed specifically for the cemetery in Storm Lake, Iowa, U.S.A.

Those interested in contributing code are encouraged to use virtualenv to manage their Python version, site-packages, and environment variables. After downloading and installing virtualenv, developers can create a virtual environment in a directory named env by typing something like pyvenv-3.5 env. To activate new virtual environment, developers should create their own .env file that can be sourced (i.e., the command to be typed would be source .env) to populate the shell with important environment variables that contain API keys, database URL's, and other configuration values that are defined in config.py. A sample .env file can be found in the repository root; it is named sample.env.

To begin installation of the app, you must first install PostgreSQL and add PostgreSQL's bin directory to your path. Run psql and type the command create database cemdb; You can then build and run the app as follows:

pip3 install -r requirements.txt
python3 manage.py db upgrade
python3 manage.py runserver

You can now browse to http://localhost:5000/ to view the running app.

If you did not add PostgreSQL's bin directory to your PATH prior to executing the above commands, you will likely see the error Error: pg_config executable not found.

New developers can develop locally on their own computers. However, at some point you may wish to deploy to the cloud. This section describes how to deploy cemetery-map to Heroku. You only need to complete the instructions in this section if you want to deploy to Heroku.

First, obtain a Heroku user ID and install the Heroku toolbelt by visiting Heroku.com. When you are logged in to the Heroku Web site and the developer dashboard, create a new Python app named cemetery-map. If that name is currently in use, you may choose a slightly different name. Then, in your shell in your local repository directory, type the following commands; these assume your app is named cemetery-map.

First, give the Heroku toolbelt your Heroku developer credentials by typing:

heroku login

Then, add a new git remote for Heroku so that we can push code to it.

heroku git:remote -a cemetery-map
git push heroku master

Our Heroku instance has environment variables that contain configuration information the same way we store info in environment variables within our virtual environment. We can see what variables have been defined by executing:

heroku config --app cemetery-map

Initially the above command will return nothing. To add config variables for our Heroku app, use the config:set command, like this:

heroku config:set APP_SETTINGS=config.ProductionConfig --remote heroku

Consult config.py to see which environment variables will need to be defined.

Finally, run the DB migrations remotely to create the necessary database tables.

heroku run python manage.py db upgrade --app cemetery-map

BVU students interested in contributing should write code that conforms to the PEP8 coding standards. Individual files should be checked by typing pep8 filename. Developers are encouraged to use GitHub's fork/pull request mechanism for contributing to this repository.