I made some test sequences and a workspace in TestStand. I want to deploy those sequences and make a MSI based executable. However, I am not sure how can I include the files for Simple or Full Featured UI into the workspace and include it during deployment or call the UI content folder directly during the deployment.
Can anyone please help me?
Just insert folder with custom user interface into workspace https://www.ni.com/docs/en-US/bundle/teststand/page/tsref/infotopics/db_add_file_to_wksp.htm.
Then you will see inserted files in Deployment Utility.
But better practice would be to separate installers of user interface, and sequence itself. Because mostly you will do more changes/updates/fixes to sequence files, so you will need to redeploy just them.
This is a big undertaking, but may be worth it for you depending on the size of your company. TestStand has an API that you can use to develop a custom GUI. That GUI can then open any sequence file you like after being compiled as a C program that runs as an executable file.
Related
So in Azure, I created a cloud service, and now I want to upload a deployment. It asks for a package (sure, that's easy, a zip file) and a configuration file (.cscfg file). I understand that the .cscfg file is supposed to define the roles, network configuration, etc.
But I don't have a cscfg file. Where are they supposed to originate? Do I have to write one by hand? The documentation for that is substandard at best. Is there any way to generate one? Or do a deployment somehow that bypasses this step? My approach must be wrong on some level (unless I really do have to write one by hand, but I somehow doubt that is a typical case).
You can either rely on Visual Studio to create it or manually create with command line tools.
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=15658
You can also create using msbuild:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsazure/hh535755.aspx
I created my iPhone app with MonoTouch and deployed it to the AppStore. Now I want to add a free lite version of the same app. What is the best way to do this with MonoTouch/MonoDevelop?
So far I created a new Provisioning Profile for the lite version. I can change the build options to use the full or the lite profile. But what else do I have to change and how? I think at least the app name should be changed, but how???
Thanks,
Christian
The way I do these things is to create a new project, then add the existing c# files from the first project as a link. You will see this option on the "add existing file" dialog. Keep in mind all your Icon/Splash screen files will have to be copied though, MonoDevelop doesn't handle these right if they are linked.
Just a side note, you can get by with less provisioning profiles. Create one as com.yourcompany.*, then name your apps com.yourcompany.yourapp1, yourapp2, etc.
So I have a profile for Development, AdHoc, and AppStore, but I have several apps deployed.
Rather than link files, I prefer to make three projects: A library project which will have all the UILogic called X.Touch.Core and two more which will have a reference of the Core. X.Touch.Lite and X.Touch.Premium. This way you don't need to have linked files, it can be painful. You can put a file called settings.xml and perform some feature toggling there.
In our company we regularly create MSI's with Installshield(latest).
These setups adhere to a set of rules and name schemes so they work with our deployment system and autobuilds etc.
Is there a way to eliminate the repetitive overhead of going through all the boilerplate stuff (setting the company meta data, basic folder structures, a few events, including some default helper files etc) for each setup?
Take a look at the InstallShield Automation interface. What I did was:
Abstract all my components out into WiX Merge Modules ( could be IS merge modules though ).
Create a base InstallShield project ( Common.ISM )
Create XML files to describe my feature tree and product configurations
Create Build Automation to reflect the XML and invoke the Automation Interface to "Emit" my installer source.
Build the Product Config in the ISM.
This gave me a great deal of code reuse but it's not trivial to set up this type of system. However it scales very well and the advantages are huge if you have the right business needs.
There are two ways you can do this:
Save the ism file in xml format (there is a setting for this in the project settings). Then in run time, push the desired values with a new application that could be written (which will edit the XML file using DOM or so...)
Use InstallShield Automation interface. This can be done using VBScript. You may check this link: InstallShield Automation Interface
I am looking at the cruisecontrol web dashboard. I can see one farm and one server. However, I don't see any way to add a project?
Is this something I can do with the UI or do I need to edit the config file by hand?
You'll need to edit the ccnet.config file by hand (located within the CruiseControl directory) to add projects. There are some graphical tools to help you do this however you do get used to doing it by hand fairly quickly - just have the documentation near by!
Update: An example of one such tool is http://www.codeplex.com/ccnetconfig
You can use CCNETConfig to edit the config file through an UI although it doesn't support higher version > CruiseControl.NET 1.4.
You have to basically edit the configuration file by hand, however I have it setup so that the raw config file is split into different include files, each of which is setup in my source control system. Then I created a project for the configuration, and then for the whole config. So when something changes in the config, CC.NET itself pulls out the changes, recreates it's config files and the refreshes the system configuration.
This means that anyone can edit the config (if they can access the files in sourcecontrol), and no-one has to go into the program files directory of the CC.NET machine itself.
Not sure whether this answers the question you asked, but this is how our setup works
I'm looking for something that can copy (preferably only changed) files from a development machine to a staging machine and finally to a set of production machines.
A "what if" mode would be nice as would the capability to "rollback" the last deployment. Database migrations aren't a necessary feature.
UPDATE: A free/low-cost tool would be great, but cost isn't the only concern. A tool that could actually manage deployment from one environment to the next (dev->staging->production instead of from a development machine to each environment) would also be ideal.
The other big nice-to-have is the ability to only copy changed files - some of our older sites contain hundreds of .asp files.
#Sean Carpenter can you tell us a little more about your environment? Should the solution be free? simple?
I find robocopy to be pretty slick for this sort of thing. Wrap in up in a batch file and you are good to go. It's a glorified xcopy, but deploying my website isn't really hard. Just copy out the files.
As far as rollbacks... You are using source control right? Just pull the old source out of there. Or, in your batch file, ALSO copy the deployment to another folder called website yyyy.mm.dd so you have a lovely folder ready to go in an emergency.
look at the for command for details on how to get the parts of the date.
robocopy.exe
for /?
Yeah, it's a total "hack" but it moves the files nicely.
For some scenarios I used a freeware product called SyncBack (Download here).
It provides complex, multi-step file synchronization (filesystem or FTP etc., compression etc.). The program has a nice graphical user interface. You can define profiles and group/execute them together.
You can set filter on file types, names etc. and execute commands/programs after the job execution. There is also a job log provided as html report, which can be sent as email to you if you schedule the job.
There is also a professional version of the software, but for common tasks the freeware should do fine.
You don't specify if you are using Visual Studio .NET, but there are a few built-in tools in Visual Studio 2005 and 2008:
Copy Website tool -- basically a visual synchronization tool, it highlights files and lets you copy from one to the other. Manual, built into Visual Studio.
aspnet_compiler.exe -- lets you precompile websites.
Of course you can create a web deployment package and deploy as an MSI as well.
I have used a combination of Cruise Control.NET, nant and MSBuild to compile, and swap out configuration files for specific environments and copy the files to a build output directory. Then we had another nant script to do the file copying (and run database scripts if necessary).
For a rollback, we would save all prior deployments, so theoretically rolling back just involved redeploying the last working build (and restoring the database).
We used UnleashIt (unfortunate name I know) which was nicely customizable and allowed you to save profiles for deploying to different servers. It also has a "backup" feature which will backup your production files before deployment so rollback should be pretty easy.
I've given up trying to find a good free product that works.
I then found Microsoft's Sync Toy 2.0 which while lacking in options works well.
BUT I need to deploy to a remote server.
Since I connect with terminal services I realized I can select my local hard drive when I connect and then in explorer on the remote server i can open \\tsclient\S\MyWebsite on the remote server.
I then use synctoy with that path and synchronize it with my server. Seems to work pretty well and fast so far...
Maybe rsync plus some custom scripts will do the trick.
Try repliweb. It handles full rollback to previous versions of files. I've used it whilst working for a client who demanded its use and I;ve become a big fan of it, partiularily:
Rollback to previous versions of code
Authentication and rules for different user roles
Deploy to multiple environments
Full reporting to the user via email / logs statiing what has changed, what the current version is etc.