I took a page from Rails and Capistrano deployment, and like the idea of versioning releases and using symbolic links. In essence, you update the latest code out of your source control system into /myapp/source, then you run a build and installation script which installs the latest copy of your code to /myapp/release-2008-05-22-114500 (timestamp), then makes a symbolic link from /myapp/current to the right version of the code. That way, if you release something broken, you can trivially roll back to a previous version. (It obviously doesn't always work for things like database schema changes.)
Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
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Re: Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
#12Re: Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
#13Use SVN and setup a postcommit thingy that copies the new files to your public directory whenever you do an update.
You'll have a problem if updates involve more than code changes. Any database scripts or configuration changes will be left undone, potentially breaking the site.
You may choose to use a tool to run your update scripts automatically and create configuration files correctly, but you'll want to think it through in advance. A particular problem I have is that certain sensitive passwords should not exist anywhere but in the locations they are required, so even pre-created configuration files still require me to manually enter the password once installed on the server.
Re: Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
#14My webserver runs Puppet and periodically pulls both the code and its own configuration from my Git repository (which I'm currently hosting on Github, but I may someday self-host).
Yes, I'm going against the grain by using Puppet instead of Capistrano. All the Rails people are probably going to crucify me, but I personally think this setup works quite well.
Re: Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
#15This is one way to do it on Windows.
Use WinKey to map win-P to project.bat.
project.bat: rsync -Crltvz -e ssh /cygdrive/c/personal/project/ me@mydomain.com:/bigfiles/project
then I can just hit win-P to force the rsync. Runs in a couple seconds even with hundreds of files.
But my favorite if I don't need version control is to use http://www.sftpdrive.com/">sftpdrive to mount the remote server as a local disk. It is $39, but is probably my favorite windows software. I've done the Samba thing and like this much better.
Re: Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
#16Git or SVN using Capistrano. If you're deploying code, you really should be using Capistrano. Even if it is not a Rails project. It is a world of difference.
I use Capistrano too. It is written in ruby but can be used by any non-ruby project.
Re: Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
#17Git or SVN using Capistrano. If you're deploying code, you really should be using Capistrano. Even if it is not a Rails project. It is a world of difference.
I use Capistrano and am quite happy with it, but even if you don't go that way, seriously look into some kind of deployment management software. Versioned deployments, simple and automatic rollbacks if something fails, and the ability to easy scale up deployments if you wind up breaking out into multiple servers for app/db/web.
It turns updating your server from a mild headache to one line that you actually enjoy typing in.
Re: Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
#18I actually have a commit hook in git that will update a copy of my website when I commit something with the right message. It's kind of crude, but it manages the busywork for me quite nicely.
Re: Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
#19[deleted]
Re: Ask YC: How do you upload to your web server?
#20Git or SVN using Capistrano. If you're deploying code, you really should be using Capistrano. Even if it is not a Rails project. It is a world of difference.
I use capistrano for PHP, Python and Ruby applications. Its simple and works.