confusion on Azure DevOps pipelines

Question

I've recently been working on switching from On premise TFS to Azure DevOps, and trying to learn more about the different pipelines and I think I may have had my Build pipeline do too much.

Currently I have my Build Pipeline do

1. Get Source code from Repo
2. Run database scripts/deploy dacpacs
3. Copy files over to virtual machines that have web application set up already
4. Run unit/integration tests
5. Publish the test results

I repeat these steps closely multiple times, one for develop branch, one for current and previous release branch.

But if I want to take advantage of the Releases and Deployments areas what would that really get me?

It looks like it would be easier to say yes this code did make it out to this dev/beta environment.

I'm working with ColdFusion code that includes some .NET webservices within the repo, would I have to make an artifact that zips up the repo and then deploys it, or is there a better way to take advantage of the release pipeline?

Answer 1

It's not necessary to make an artifact that zips up the repo and then deploys it. There are several types of tools you might use in your application lifecycle process to produce or store artifacts. For example, you might use version control systems such as Git or TFVC to store your artifacts. You can configure Azure Pipelines to deploy artifacts from multiple sources. Check the following link for more details:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/devops/pipelines/release/artifacts?view=azure-devops#sources