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Mark Munyaka
Mark Munyaka

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Deploy a Static Astro Site on Railway

#deploy #astro #railway #webdev

Deploying a Static Astro Site on Railway

Astro is a framework for building websites. Railway is a platform for hosting web apps. This guide shows you how you can host an Astro website on Railway.

Prerequisites

  • GitHub Account
  • Railway Account
  • Node.js

Create Astro app

On your local machine, create a new folder named 'my-app'.

mkdir my-app
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Open my-app.

cd my-app
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Create a package.json file and add the following:

{
  "scripts": {
    "dev": "astro dev",
    "start": "astro dev",
    "build": "astro build",
    "preview": "astro preview"
  },
  "dependencies": {
    "astro": "^4.16.5"
  }
}
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Install the dependencies.

npm install
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Create a src/pages folder and add a src/pages/index.astro file.

mkdir -p src/pages && touch src/pages/index.astro
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Add this to src/pages/index.astro

<h1>Hello, World!</h1>
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Run the development server.

npm run dev
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Visit http://localhost:4321 to view your site.

lynx localhost:4321
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Build Site

Stop your server and build your Astro site:

npm run build
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Astro will produce a dist folder containing the static site you will deploy.

Preview your build:

npm run preview
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Deploy to Railway

Install the Railway CLI tool:

npm i -g @railway/cli
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Login to your Railway account:

railway login --browserless
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Create a new Railway project:

railway init
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Link the dist folder to your Railway project.

Change working directory to dist.

cd dist
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Link current directory, i.e. dist to your Railway project.

railway link
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Deploy your app.

railway up --detach
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When site is ready, generate a domain.

railway domain
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Test Deployment 

lynx <YOUR-APP-DOMAIN>
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Update Site and Redeploy

Update home page, src/pages/index.astro:

<h1>Hello World!</h1>
<p>Happy to be here</p>
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Test update locally:

npm run dev
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Rebuild site:

npm run build
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Redeploy to Railway.

cd dist && railway up --detach
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