ERP5 VM are the recommended way for end-users who just want an ERP5 environment up and running on their server. It is also the recommended way for developers who do not need to modify ERP5 core source code. This package is not recommended for a large production environment with many users. It is not recommended for development.
Slapos (Buildout) is the recommended way to install ERP5 for developers willing to contribute to ERP5 core or who need to implement complex integration of ERP5 with other packages. It is the recommended way to setup ERP5 on a production environment.
How to use and install ERP5 VM
This procedure is recommended for end users willing to try ERP5. Through this procedure, you will obtain a pre-configured ERP5 instance based on pre-defined business templates and categories.
The Virtual Machine package includes the whole software stack of ERP5 and its dependencies.
To install the VM and use it you should follow the tutorial How to install and use the ERP5 VM (presentation).
Installation through SlapOS
Installing ERP5 using SlapOS (a distributed Cloud operating system based on buildout and supervisord) is the recommended way to install ERP5 for developers willing to contribute to the core of ERP5. It is also the recommended way to setup a production environment for ERP5 or to setup an environment to launch test suites in parallel. SlapOS goes beyond the concept of sofware package by including backup, monitoring and elastic scalability policies into so-called profiles and recipes. SlapOS provides a framework to launch ERP5 unit tests and functional tests over a collection of distributed inexpensive computers. By using SlapOS developers can share not only the source code of ERP5 itself but also their best practices in the field of system administration and performance optimization. SlapOS even helps running tests faster by reusing if necessary each developer laptop as a test runner.
In order to install ERP5 with SlapOS, you need to proceed in four steps:
ERP5 instances created in this way include a configurator which provides different kind of configurations to your instance. It can configure an ERP for SME, a demo ERP with sample data or a web office suite. It should also be noted that once the instance is created, the connection to VIFIB is no longer required and the instance can be operated in an cleanroom environment without Internet connection.