Azure Web Role Deployment

Question

I have a Web Role in Azure that is under development. I would like to make a package that can be published and tested in staging environment without the help of Visual Studio. Is there a way to publish if just the package is provided?

Answer 1

You can use cspack to actually create the package, but from your question it sounds more like you are asking can you publish an already created package. The answer is yes.

There are multiple ways to do this and I'll provide three:

1) The management portal: you can deploy a package if you have the cspkg and csconfig files. Under the Cloud Services you can select a cloud service and select to deploy to the production or staging slot. You can also do this as part of creating a new cloud service in the portal. http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/manage/services/cloud-services/how-to-create-and-deploy-a-cloud-service/

2) You can use Windows Azure PowerShell and CLI command line tools to deploy an already packaged deployment. In fact, you can also automate packaging and deploying. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsazure/jj883943.aspx

3) Using a tool like Cerebrata's Azure Management Studio you can also deploy already created packages : http://www.cerebrata.com/products/azure-management-studio/features

In additiont to being able to deploy an already created package, for Cloud Services you can also wire up to the hosted TFS service and have it deploy your web app when you do a check in. http://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/develop/net/common-tasks/publishing-with-tfs/