Getting Started With Sahana-Eden

I was introduced to Sahana Open Source Disaster Management Platform few years ago at FOSS.in 2008. But never contributed any code to this project until the SahanaCamp 1.2 in Hanoi last week.

Sahana-Eden is based on web2py python web development framework. Coding with Model-View-Control(MVC) framework is breath of fresh air and I dived headlong into the code on day one of the event. Thanks to Fran Boon, for helping creating this quick tutorial for Sahana-eden developer setup.

# Get all dependent packages for sahana-eden 
sudo apt-get install python-lxml python-reportlab python-xlwt python-shapely libgeos-3.2.0

# Create a directory to store web2py and sahana-eden source files
mkdir ~/Sahana

cd Sahana

# Checkout web2py source code
bzr branch lp:~mdipierro/web2py/devel web2py

# web2py applications are stored in directory
cd web2py/applications

# Checkout sahana-eden source
# Note web2py doesn't like - in directory names (Thanks fran!)
bzr branch lp:sahana-eden eden

# Change to base directory
cd ~/Sahana

# Launch rocket web server with password 'eden' 
python web2py/web2py.py -a eden 
web2py Enterprise Web Framework
Created by Massimo Di Pierro, Copyright 2007-2010
Version 1.85.3 (2010-09-18 07:07:46)
Database drivers available: pysqlite2
Starting hardcron...
please visit:
       http://127.0.0.1:8000
starting browser...in 5 seconds

# Open the webpage and login with password 'eden'
firefox http://127.0.0.1:8000/eden

# On first run, sahana-eden creates 000_config.py and cron/ files
# Change FINISHED_EDITING_CONFIG_FILE = True in 000_config.py file
nano web2py/applications/eden/models/000_config.py

# You are done! Start hacking and send it your patches!