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First deploy

With a configured hox.toml and a software release pushed to its branch, one command takes you from nothing on the master to an instance that passes its checks:

hox deploy my-app

What it does

  1. Refuses an unpushed branch. The node fetches the release from GitHub: a commit that is only local would give it a 404, or an older release. hox then waits until raw.githubusercontent.com serves the pushed files, since it caches branch files for up to 5 minutes.
  2. Does the panel work (hox setup): it creates the records the master needs before it lets your release run on your node (see the glossary). It opens your node's allocation scope and creates the Software Product with its software type and the branch URL as a release. It also creates the Allocation Supply <product> on <node title>, with the (release × software type) cell ticked, and validates it. It skips each step that is already done.
  3. Supplies the branch URL on your node, so that the node builds it.
  4. Requests the instance (hox request) on your node.
  5. Waits for the allocation (30 minutes at most): the master allocates a partition on your node to the instance.
  6. Waits for the build (8 hours at most). The node's own cron builds what is supplied. A large release on a node with an empty cache takes hours: Node.js and LLVM alone took 8 hours for Abilian SBE, a large Python web application.
  7. Runs the instance once, for the instance's own partition only.
  8. Waits for the checks to pass (45 minutes at most). Rapid.Space's shared frontend takes a while to publish the instance's public address.

Each wait says what it waits for. If a step fails or times out, fix the cause and run hox deploy again: what is done is skipped.

Then

hox status my-app      # the instance, its services, frontends, builds and promises
hox instances          # every instance of the project, with its status

The instance's name is instance in hox.toml. The SlapOS master doesn't let an instance change its release URL, so that name changes when you move to a release at a given commit: see Releases and instances.

For the daily work after this, see the development loop.