Create Production Deployment Guide and Infrastructure-as-Code

[prodbycorne]

Description

Provide complete deployment documentation and infrastructure code for production deployments.

Requirements

• Write deployment guide for: Vercel (frontend), AWS/GCP (backend), RDS (database)
• Create Terraform modules for backend infrastructure
• Create Kubernetes deployment YAML files
• Create Docker Compose production configuration
• Document environment variables for all services
• Create secrets management guide (AWS Secrets Manager, Vault)
• Add monitoring setup (Prometheus, Grafana, or Datadog)
• Create alerting rules for critical failures
• Document scaling strategy (horizontal/vertical)
• Add backup and disaster recovery procedures
• Create CI/CD pipeline examples (GitHub Actions, GitLab CI)
• Security hardening checklist

Deliverables

• /docs/deployment/PRODUCTION.md comprehensive guide
• /infra/terraform/ directory with modules
• /infra/k8s/ directory with manifests
• docker-compose.prod.yml file
• CI/CD workflow files in .github/workflows/

Acceptance Criteria

• ✅ Someone can deploy SmartDrop to production following the guide
• ✅ Infrastructure code is tested and working
• ✅ All security best practices are documented
• ✅ Monitoring and alerting is configured
• ✅ Backup procedures are clear

Estimated Effort: 10-14 hours
Priority: Hard
Labels: devops, documentation, infrastructure, production

[DammyAji]

Hi Maintainer, can you assign me to this issue please? I'm a software developer, and i understand the importance of having proper detailed guides to implement structures and algorithms. Thanks in advance.

[mariocodecr]

Hi! I’m a full-stack and DevOps-oriented engineer with experience deploying and maintaining production-grade applications across cloud environments using Docker, Kubernetes, Terraform, CI/CD pipelines, and infrastructure-as-code practices. I’ve worked on systems that required scalable deployments, observability, automated delivery pipelines, and secure infrastructure configuration.

I’m comfortable bridging development and operations workflows to ensure applications are reproducible, secure, and production-ready.

Proposed Solution

My approach would be to create a complete production deployment foundation that combines infrastructure code, operational documentation, monitoring, and deployment automation into a cohesive setup.

Implementation plan:

• Create a comprehensive deployment guide:
  • frontend deployment on Vercel
  • backend deployment on AWS/GCP
  • PostgreSQL/RDS setup
  • networking and environment configuration
  • production rollout steps
• Build Terraform infrastructure modules under /infra/terraform/ for:
  • compute resources
  • networking
  • managed databases
  • secrets integration
  • monitoring dependencies
• Create Kubernetes manifests under /infra/k8s/:
  • Deployments
  • Services
  • Ingress
  • ConfigMaps
  • Secrets references
  • autoscaling configuration
• Add a production-ready docker-compose.prod.yml for simplified deployments and local production parity.
• Document all required environment variables and recommended configuration strategies for each service.
• Create secrets management documentation using:
  • AWS Secrets Manager
  • Vault
  • secure environment injection practices
• Add monitoring and observability setup:
  • Prometheus/Grafana or Datadog integration
  • health checks
  • metrics exposure
  • log aggregation recommendations
• Define alerting rules for:
  • service downtime
  • failed deployments
  • database connectivity issues
  • abnormal resource usage
• Document:
  • horizontal and vertical scaling strategies
  • backup policies
  • disaster recovery workflows
  • rollback procedures
• Provide CI/CD workflow examples:
  • GitHub Actions
  • GitLab CI
  • automated testing/build/deploy pipelines
• Include a security hardening checklist covering:
  • secrets handling
  • HTTPS/TLS
  • least-privilege IAM
  • container security
  • dependency scanning
  • production environment protections

Why I’m a Good Fit

I have strong experience with:

• Docker and Kubernetes
• Terraform and infrastructure as code
• CI/CD pipelines
• AWS and cloud infrastructure
• production monitoring and observability
• secure deployment workflows
• backend scalability and operational reliability

I’ve also worked on deployment systems where reproducibility, maintainability, and operational clarity were essential, so I understand how important good documentation and infrastructure consistency are for teams and contributors.

Additional Insights

Beyond simply creating deployment files, I would focus on making the infrastructure approachable and maintainable for future contributors. My goal would be to ensure someone unfamiliar with the project could reliably deploy and operate the system using the provided documentation.

I would also prioritize modular infrastructure design so the project can evolve over time without requiring major operational rewrites, especially as scaling, monitoring, and security requirements grow.

[grantfox-oss]

🦊 GrantFox — @mariocodecr has been assigned to this issue as part of the Official Campaign campaign!

Next steps:

1. Open a Pull Request referencing this issue (e.g., Closes #9)
2. Your PR will be reviewed by the SmartDropLabs maintainers

Good luck! Track your progress on GrantFox.

[mariocodecr]

Hi @prodbycorne — before starting work on this I'd like to confirm the scope, because the issue requirements seem to
assume a service architecture that doesn't match what's currently in this repo. Want to flag this early so we don't ship
boilerplate that doesn't deploy anything.

What this repo actually is

server at runtime, no API routes, no middleware.

• The README explicitly states the architecture is split across repos:
  • smartdrop-frontend (this repo) → the Next.js web app
  • smartdrop-contracts → Soroban smart contracts (Rust)
  • smartdrop-backend → APIs and indexing (planned, not yet created)
• Current deployment targets are Vercel and GitHub Pages (both static hosting). There is no database, no server-side
  runtime, and no runtime secrets (every config value is NEXT_PUBLIC_* and ships to the browser).

Where the requirements seem to mismatch

Requirement	Issue	Why it doesn't fit here
Terraform modules for backend	"backend infrastructure" doesn't exist in this repo	Belongs in smartdrop-backend
Kubernetes deployment YAML	There's no containerized workload	Static export is served from a CDN, not a pod
docker-compose.prod.yml	Same — nothing to orchestrate	Belongs in smartdrop-backend
RDS setup	No database in this project	The "DB" is on-chain (Soroban)
AWS Secrets Manager / Vault guide	No runtime secrets exist in a static SPA	NEXT_PUBLIC_* values are public by
definition
Prometheus / Grafana monitoring	No server metrics to scrape	Frontend observability = browser RUM (Sentry, Vercel
Analytics)

Proposed split

Could we scope this issue (or split it) so that:

• This repo ships: docs/deployment/PRODUCTION.md (Vercel + GH Pages), CI/CD hardening, vercel.json security
  headers, monitoring strategy (Sentry + Vercel Analytics + synthetic uptime), env vars reference, frontend security
  checklist, backup/DR runbook for the static deliverable.
• smartdrop-backend (when bootstrapped) ships: Terraform modules, Kubernetes manifests, docker-compose.prod.yml,
  RDS setup, Secrets Manager / Vault guide, Prometheus / Grafana stack, backend-specific CI/CD and DR.

This keeps each repo's deployment guide useful and avoids parking ~2000 lines of infrastructure code in a repo that can't
exercise it.

Questions

1. Is smartdrop-backend planned soon enough that we should split this issue and open a corresponding one there?
2. Or would you prefer I generate the backend infra as a template in this repo (under e.g. infra/template/) with
   clear disclaimers, to be migrated later?
3. Is there context I'm missing — e.g. a plan to drop output: "export" and run this as a Node server, which would change
   the answer?

Happy to proceed with whichever direction you want. Just want alignment before writing the work.

[mariocodecr]

@prodbycorne can you help me with this? or can you give me your telegram user and I will text you