LightSwitch 2013: Application Deployment using Command Prompt msdeploy - Batch File

Configure Basic Settings

To start with deployment for Light Switch application, first publish the application using Publish Wizard, but before starting to pubilsh lightswitch application we need to install ‘Microsoft Web Platform Installer’ in the hosting machine. After that we need to start the ‘Web Deployment Agent’ Services from the administrative tools.

LightSwitch Publish Wizard

Once web platform installer get install we get he option for publish website, click on the publish and following wizard get open;

In the Application Type section, select ‘Complete application’ option and click Next;

In the Application Server Configuration  section, select ‘IIS Server’ option and click Next;

In the Publish Output section, we get 2 option which deploys application directly on IIS Server or create package, we are going to select the option for ‘Create a package on disk’ as we need to change our connection string as per stage/prod environment. Click on Next button;

In the Publish Settings section, enter the details for website name and also select the path to create package for LightSwitch application and click on Next;

In the Security Settings section select ‘No’ for not to create Application Administrator, as we are not using AspNetMembershipProvider ‘Profiles’ and ‘Roles’ and click on Next button;

In this Data Connection section, do not mark on ‘Generate the SQL database script’ as we are not using/creating any new database rather we are attaching existing data source, so go to next tab ‘Attached Data Source’ ;

Add the connection string for the ‘MyData’ and click on Next button;

(#Note: Please make sure you have selected Integrated Security = SSPI.)

Once all setting done, click on the Publish button to ‘Publish’ the LightSwitch application.

Once the code is published we get the following set of files in the publish folder;

Command Line Deployment for LS Application

Create new folder “DeployBatch” and place some important files in it. Following are required files;

TemplateNewAppPool.zip and TemplateNewWebSite.zip

To deploy LS application, we need AppPool and WebSite on the IIS Server, so we can create TemplateNewAppPool, TemplateNewWebSite and batch file with msdeploy commands in it.

Please find the reference to create both templates as following;

To create new TemplateNewAppPool click here.

To create new TemplateNewWebSite click here. 

(Note: we have skips the steps which required for https)

So we get following files for creating template for AppPool;

TemplateAppPoolPackage.zip
AppPoolParameters.xml and
DeployNewAppPool.cmd

And following files for creating template for website

TemplateWebSitePackage.zip
WebSiteParameters.xml and
DeployNewWebSite.cmd

Batch file to run msdeploy command

Create new batch file which will have commands to execute packages to create template for new App pool, new Web Site and deploying our Systembolaget.Web.Admin web site.

Following commands will be included in batch file;

echo create new appPool

@echo off

CALL E:\Published\DeployBatch\DeployNewAppPool.cmd

echo create new webSite

@echo off

CALL E:\Published\DeployBatch\DeployNewWebSite.cmd

echo replace SetParameter.xml file with stage/prod SetParameter.xml file

@echo off

COPY E:\Published\DeployBatch\LSApplicationSample.SetParameters.xml E:\Published\LSApplication /Y

echo SetParameter.xml replaced!

echo Run deployment package..

@echo off

CALL E:\Published\LSApplication\LSApplicationSample.deploy.cmd /Y

echo replace authorization.xml file with stage/prod authorization.xml file

COPY E:\Published\DeployBatch\authorization.config E:\WebSites\LSApplication /Y

echo authorization.xml replaced!

echo LSApplication website created successfully!

Lets name the batch file as “DeployLSAppPackage.bat”

Authorization.config for prodtest/prod environment

Add new config file “authorization.config” as per the environment where we are going to deploy this package.

For example for stage we have following groups;

<authorization>

  <allow roles="my-roles\AdminGroupStage"/>

  <deny users="*"/>

</authorization>

And for prod we have following groups;

<authorization>

  <allow roles="my-roles\AdminGroupProd"/>

  <deny users="*"/>

  </authorization>

So keep the group name as per environment given by admin team.

LSApplicationSample.SetParameter.xml

By default, when you open ‘LSApplicationSample.SetParameters.xml’ file from Published folder you will get following options to set values;

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

<parameters>

  <setParameter name="DatabaseServer" value="" />

  <setParameter name="DatabaseName" value="LSApplicationSample" />

  <setParameter name="DatabaseUserName" value="" />

  <setParameter name="DatabaseUserPassword" value="" />

  <setParameter name="LSApplicationSample_IisWebApplication" value="Default Web Site/LSApplication" />

  <setParameter name="MyData" value="" />

</parameters>

So copy above “LSApplicationSample.SetParameters.xml” file in “DeployBatch” folder and keep only required parameters as follows;

Delete unwanted params

As you can see, we have different name/value pair options to set the parameter value, but here we have attached existing database and also we are following windows authentication, in that case we don’t required values for Database related settings.

So here we can delete top 4 params related to database.

Set Custom Application Pool

By default for "LSApplicationSample_IisWebApplication" we have value as "Default Web Site/LSApplication", so we can change Default Web Site to ‘myAppPool’ or any app pool name which we are going to create.

So for an example here we can change it to

  <setParameter name="LSApplicationSample_IisWebApplication" value="myAppPool/LSApplication" />

Set Connection String

So finally we can set different connection string for different environment, add the value for MyData param as follows;

<setParameter name="MyData" value="new connection string for stage/prod environment" />

Run DeployWebAdminPackage.bat file

We have created all the required files which we need for deployment for light switch application, the folder structure for DeployBatch is as follows;

Next step is to open with command prompt in administrative rights and run the DeployLSAppPackage.bat file. You will get the desire output as follows;

Once you run the batch file we can check the output in the output directory, if error files doesn’t contain any error then our application is deployed succefully on the IIS Server.

Note: Remember to enable directory browsing in IIS server.