phio 0.4: Deploy Over SFTP

If you use phio dev or phio deploy, you were still on FTPS. Port 21. Email and password. The same pain we have been telling everyone to leave behind.

phio 0.4 is out. Deploy and watch mode now sync over SFTP on port 2222, same as Cyberduck and the rest of your toolchain. One less reason to keep FTPS bookmarks alive.

npm install -g [email protected]

Full reference: phio CLI.

What changed

SFTP transport. phio dev and phio deploy talk to ftp.pockethost.io:2222 with an Ed25519 key, not FTPS on 21. Same virtual instance layout. Same incremental sync and .ftp-deploy-sync-state.json at the instance root. Only the wire protocol changed.

Auto deploy key. On first login or deploy, phio generates a local Ed25519 keypair and registers it under Account → Keys with the label Phio. You do not paste a public key by hand unless you want a separate CI key. Run phio info to see fingerprint and registration status.

.phioconfig. phio link now writes a small JSON file in your project root instead of stuffing instanceName into package.json or a standalone pockethost.json:

{
  "instanceName": "my-instance"
}

Commit it. Old configs migrate automatically the first time you run phio in that directory.

Quick start (new or upgrading)

npm install -g [email protected]
phio login
phio link my-instance
phio dev

Watch mode pushes pb_hooks, pb_migrations, package.json, lockfiles, and patches/**. It still skips pb_data/**.

One-shot deploy:

phio deploy

CI can set PHIO_USERNAME, PHIO_PASSWORD, and PHIO_INSTANCE_NAME instead of interactive login. Example workflow in the docs.

If you were on FTPS phio

Upgrade to 0.4 and run deploy again. phio handles the key and SFTP session. Retire any FTPS-specific env or firewall rules for port 21 when you are ready.

Manual SFTP clients are unchanged. See SFTP File Access and FTPS sunset for the platform timeline.

What is next

GitHub Actions that still use SamKirkland/FTP-Deploy-Action on port 21 need a separate migration. phio deploy in CI is the path we document today. Raw SFTP action examples land when upstream catches up.

Questions or weird deploy output after upgrading? Discord.

PocketHost

PocketHost