HOWTO: Moving a Web from a Staging Server to a Production Server

ID: Q168418

The information in this article applies to:

SUMMARY

With Visual InterDev, you can have your entire Web development team working on Web files that are tested on the staging server. After you are confident the versions of the files are ready to move to the production server, you can copy the Web site from the staging server to the production server.


MORE INFORMATION

For small sites, you can copy the updated files to the production server using the Web Copy command.

Use the following steps to copy the development Web site to the production Web site:

  1. Make sure that the team has added any new files to the Web project and saved the files to the staging Web server. If your team is using Visual SourceSafe, make sure all of the files are checked in and release all working copies to the Web staging server.


  2. Make sure that the database access settings for the production server are the same access settings on the staging server.

    NOTE: To make database access easier, use File DSNs rather than System DSNs to connect to the database. You should do this because the System DSN uses only the DSN name in the script generated by Visual InterDev in the Global.asa file. The rest of the information is retrieved from the registry based on the name. In contrast, if you select a file DSN, all the connection information in the .dsn file is copied into the script that Visual InterDev generates in the Global.asa file. Because the connection information has been copied into the script, you no longer need the original .dsn file in order to connect to the database server, and the connection information travels with the Web site wherever it goes. (See HELP Keyword: "file DSNs described," Topic: "Using ODBC System DSN & File DSN).


  3. In File View, select the directory for the project files you want to copy. You can do this at any directory level you need.


  4. From the Project menu, select Copy Web, and copy the Web site to the production server.


  5. If you want to copy only the files that are new or updated, select the Copy Changed Files Only option.


NOTE: The security settings for the copied files are inherited from the root project on the production server. If you want the security settings to be unique, the Web administrator needs to change the security settings for the files on the production server.

For large sites, or commercial sites where you want more control over updating and propagating files, review the information about Microsoft Commercial Internet System at:
http://www.microsoft.com/mcis/


REFERENCES

Visual InterDev online User's Guide; search on InfoView topic, "Copying a Web."

Visual InterDev HELP; search on "file DSNs described," Topic: "Using ODBC System DSN & File DSN).

For the latest Knowledge Base articles and other support information on Visual InterDev and Active Server Pages, see the following page on the Microsoft Technical Support site:

http://support.microsoft.com/support/vinterdev/

Additional query words: 


Keywords          : kbide kbVisID kbVisID100 kbGrpASP kbIDEProject 
Version           : WINDOWS:1.0
Platform          : WINDOWS 
Issue type        : kbhowto

Last Reviewed: June 11, 1999