Deploying Spring Boot to Google Cloud Platform

Recently, I've been working on deploying my personal website (built with Spring Boot) to Google Cloud Platform. The experience has been both educational and rewarding, so I wanted to share some practical insights.

Why Google Cloud Platform?

After evaluating several cloud providers, I chose GCP for several reasons:

• App Engine: Serverless deployment with automatic scaling
• Cloud Storage: Perfect for storing blog content as markdown files
• Secret Manager: Secure credential management
• Integrated ecosystem: Everything works seamlessly together

The Architecture

My setup consists of:

Spring Boot Application
├── App Engine (hosting)
├── Cloud Storage (blog content)
├── Secret Manager (credentials)
└── Cloud Build (CI/CD)

Key Configuration Files

app.yaml

runtime: java21
service: default
automatic_scaling:
  min_instances: 0
  max_instances: 10

application.properties

spring.config.import=sm://
gcs.bucket.name=my-blog-bucket
spring.cloud.gcp.credentials.encoded-key=${sm://my-secret}

Lessons Learned

1. Keep it simple: Start with basic deployment, then add complexity
2. Use Secret Manager: Never hardcode credentials
3. Monitor costs: Set up billing alerts early
4. Test locally: Use the Cloud SDK for local development

The Blog Integration

One of the coolest features is how blog posts work:

• Write markdown files with frontmatter
• Upload to Cloud Storage
• Blog automatically renders them with site styling
• No code deployment needed!

This approach gives me the flexibility to write anywhere and publish by simply uploading a file.

Next Steps

I'm planning to add:

• Automated deployment via Cloud Build
• CDN integration for better performance
• Enhanced monitoring and logging

The journey of building and deploying on GCP continues to be exciting. The platform's flexibility and power make it an excellent choice for modern applications.

What's your experience with cloud deployments? I'd love to hear about your setup!