Common tasks
Many of the kinds of administrative tasks you perform using the Uniform dashboard or the CLI can also be done programmatically using the Uniform APIs.
Backup and restore#
Why backup and restore?#
A common operational need is to keep multiple deployment environments in sync with each other. For example:
| Purpose | Example |
|---|---|
| Separate by user |
|
| Separate by purpose |
|
For Uniform, this is done using serialization of project assets, such as Uniform Canvas components or compositions and Uniform Context signals and enrichments, to files on disk. These files can then be committed to source control and shared between environments, or used to scaffold templates and demos.
Which project assets can you backup & restore?#
Sync command#
There is a single command to backup & restore all project assets:
Sync specific project assets#
The Uniform CLI also provides the ability to granularly backup and restore the following project assets:
| Category | Type |
|---|---|
| Canvas | Assets |
| Canvas | Components |
| Canvas | Compositions |
| Canvas | Component patterns |
| Canvas | Composition patterns |
| Canvas | Categories |
| Canvas | Content types |
| Canvas | Entries |
| Canvas | Entry patterns |
| Canvas | Data sources |
| Canvas | Data types |
| Canvas | Locales |
| Canvas | Preview URLs |
| Canvas | Preview viewport |
| Canvas | Worfklow |
| Context | Audiences & intents |
| Context | Enrichments |
| Context | Quirks |
| Context | Signals |
| Context | Tests |
| Integration | Definitions |
| Project map | Definitions |
| Project map | Nodes |
| Redirect | Definitions |
tip
Data sources cannot be synced because they generally contain secrets that should not be written to files.
Data sources may be directly created using the CLI, for the purposes of scaffolding them if they do not contain secrets.
Automate backup & restore#
This section describes how to add backup and restore scripts to a Node project. Your CI/CD process can trigger the script to automate backup & restore.
Prerequisites
These instructions assume you already have a Node project and a Uniform project.
Make sure the following dependencies are included in your Node project. If you need to add them, you can add them as developer dependencies:
@uniformdev/cliMake sure you have a
.envfile with the values needed to connect to your Uniform project.UNIFORM_API_KEY=<YOUR API KEY> UNIFORM_PROJECT_ID=<YOUR PROJECT ID>Add Configuration file
uniform.config.tsto the root of your project (you can find configuration schema here):uniform.config.ts
import type { CLIConfiguration } from '@uniformdev/cli'; require('dotenv').config(); const config: CLIConfiguration = { serialization: { format: "yaml", mode: "mirror", directory: "./uniform-data", entitiesConfig: { asset: {}, composition: { push: { // May be useful to only create new compositions and not update existing ones to avoid accidental overrides mode: 'create' } }, component: {}, componentPattern: {}, category: {}, contentType: {}, entry: {}, entryPattern: {}, dataType: {}, signal: {}, test: {}, aggregate: {}, enrichment: {}, locale: {}, quirk: {}, projectMapDefinition: {}, projectMapNode: {}, redirect: {}, workflow: {}, } } }; module.exports = config;Add the following scripts to your
package.jsonfile:package.json
{ "name": "my-package", "version": "0.1.0", "private": true, "scripts": { "pull": "uniform sync pull", "push": "uniform sync push" }, "devDependencies": { "@uniformdev/cli": "latest" } }To backup the assets in your Uniform project, run the following command.
Backup project assets
npm run pullAbout this step
A file for each project asset is created in the sub folders under the folder
data.To restore the assets to your Uniform project, run the following command:
Restore project assets
npm run pushAbout this step
Project assets stored in the sub folders under the folder
dataare restored to your Uniform project.
tip
Another useful technique with pushing and pulling is to perform bulk updates. Since the serialized files are plain YAML (or JSON), you can use your favorite tools such as jq to modify them before pushing them back into Uniform.
Backup assets to a single file#
For CI/CD environments it's best to produce a single artifact instead of many serialized files to define the state of Uniform. To support this, the Uniform CLI allows you to use the pull and push commands directly to a package file instead of multiple files on disk.
To use this feature, specify a filename instead of an output directory in configuration filename property:
uniform.config.js
To add multiple types of product assets to a single file, change global directory property to filename with yaml or json extension: