Web site deployment software

Question

I work for a company that has a multi tier web site. So we have several front end sites talking to several back end web services. All this is load balanced across several servers and hosted in IIS 6.0.

When we do a new release we need to copy several sites from a staging environment onto a pre live version on the live web servers. The number and types of sites deployed in any release could vary. Currently use robocopy scripts/bat files to do this. Which works but is prone to errors and is difficult to maintain.

Does anyone have any experience of some good, preferably open source, deployment software which may aid us in this task?

Answer 1

I would use PowerShell and its WebAdministration module. Also have a look at Scott Hanselman's article here, where he explains the WebDeploy packaging and deployment solution (on Channel9 also).

Answer 2

We use a continuous integration server and Web Deploy . The only manual steps are triggering the build in the CI server.

We use TeamCity , which has a limited free version. CruiseControl.NET is an open source CI server, but the configuration isn't nearly as nice as TeamCity.

Here are a few articles on setting up TeamCity for deployment:

• http://www.diaryofaninja.com/blog/2010/05/09/automated-site-deployments-with-teamcity-deployment-projects-amp-svn
• http://www.troyhunt.com/2010/11/you-deploying-it-wrong-teamcity_26.html