SharePoint Migration from Dev to Live

Question

I am going to be in the process of taking my dev site and putting it on live. Just wondering if there is anything I need to be aware of or any tips/software to do so?

Answer 1

Features, features, and more features. And solutions. Everything (and I do mean everything) I do is done in dev but then packaged into a feature for deployment to test/staging then production. This includes anything from page layouts, master pages, CEWP web parts, to full blown solutions with web parts, receivers and custom code.

Seriously it takes 2 minutes to slam together the feature code around whatever solution you may have. Take the wsp and deploy.

Advantages are
a) The deployment will handle pushing out all changes to all web front ends
b) You can easily pull it back if you need to
c) It can be upgraded (although it's not pretty, it is simple)
d) You take the exact same WSP and deploy to production.

An added bonus would be to get the SharePoint Installer project from CodePlex to turn your wsp into an exe you can just hand off to your network guys and let them install it.

Answer 2

There are tools and techniques depending on what (code, content, configuration) you are trying to promote from development to production. Tell us a bit more at what your trying to accomplish and we can point you in the right direction.