Philadelphia Property Search App

You can use this application to search and compare property data in the City of Philadelphia

Technology

This application is a JavaScript single-page app written in Backbone.js with Underscore templates. It is written in modules, using Require.js for AMD loading, and uses Grunt.js for the build process. Language support is provided by Require.js' i18n module, which loads dictionary files asynchronously.

Help Improve This App

We'd welcome your suggestions and feedback. Please submit issues and pull requests on the GitHub repository.

Installation

First, make sure you have node.js installed.

1. Clone the repository and its submodule by using git clone --recursive git@github.com:CityOfPhiladelphia/property.git
2. Navigate inside the newly created directory by using cd property
3. Install server dependencies by using npm install (will install the packages in package.json)
4. Install bower package manager globally by using sudo npm install -g bower (it may prompt you to re-enter your password)
5. Install client dependencies by using bower install (will install the packages in bower.json)

Running Locally

You can now browse to the app/ directory in the browser to view the development version of the app, which will load more slowly since it loads every file separately. To build the app into a single, production file, use grunt and browse to the app/build/ directory in the browser.

Source Control

To push changes back to the repository, navigate to the root directory of the app and use git add . to find all changes in the directory, then git commit -m "Summary of the changes" to group the changes into one commit, then git push origin master to push the changes to the GitHub repository.

Production Deployment

The build process puts files in the app/build/ directory, which is ignored by the git repository. To push the built app to production, we'll create another git repository inside the app/build/ directory using the gh-pages branch. To do this:

1. Delete the app/build/ directory
2. Navigate to app/
3. Use git clone -b gh-pages -o production git@github.com:CityOfPhiladelphia/property.git build to clone the gh-pages branch of the repository into the app/build/ directory and name the remote "production"

Once you've done that, you can run the build process described above, then navigate inside app/build/ and use git add ., git commit -m "Summary of changes", and git push production gh-pages to deploy. Be sure to specify gh-pages in the final command or you will experience merge issues.