c# barcode maker FigURE 8-16 Web Deployment Project properties. in Visual C#

Draw QR in Visual C# FigURE 8-16 Web Deployment Project properties.

After configuring the Web Deployment Project, right-click it in Solution Explorer and then click Build to generate the assembly or assemblies.

For the real world, know that you need to use Web Deployment Projects when you do not want to store the source code on the web server or when management requires signed assemblies. Because it is an add-on for Visual Studio 2010, you probably will not see any questions about it on the exam, however.

Publishing websites gives you a great deal of control over the website configuration while still providing a high level of automation. However, it requires administrators to have specially configured the web server to allow you to publish the website. Even if you create a package for the administrators to perform the installation, administrators will not be able to easily take advantage of a software distribution infrastructure that requires Microsoft Windows Installer (MSI) packages. Finally, Visual Studio does not precompile published websites. The sections that follow describe how to create a Web Setup Project, which provides the highest level of flexibility for deploying a website. Although Web Setup Projects are more complex for the developer, they allow you to generate an MSI package, precompile a website, and perform virtually any setup task that your application might require. This section describes how to configure deployment properties, how to configure deployment conditions, and how to deploy websites that meet the requirements of the aforementioned scenarios.

Web Setup Projects are very similar to the standard setup projects used for Windows Forms applications; however, Web Setup Projects provide specialized capabilities that are required by websites. To add a Web Setup Project to a website, follow these steps:

1. 2. 3.

Open your website in Visual Studio. From the File menu (or by right-clicking your solution in Solution Explorer), select Add, and then select New Project to launch the Add New Project dialog box. Under Installed Templates, expand Other Project Types, expand Setup And Deployment, and then select Visual Studio Installer. From the list of available templates, select Web Setup Project. In the Name text box, type a name for your project. An example of the Add New Project dialog box is shown in Figure 8-17.

After you have created a new Web Setup Project, Visual Studio adds the project to your solution and displays the File System editor. The typical next step is to create a project output group by right-clicking the Web Application Folder, selecting Add, and then selecting Project Output. In the Add Project Output Group dialog box, you select the project to deploy, the Content Files option, and the configuration (which is Active by default). This ensures that your setup project will deploy the contents of the selected project.

After you have created a Web Setup Project, you can add more folders, files, assemblies, and configuration settings that are not part of your project output to the Web Setup Project. This might be necessary if, for example, you have a separate folder containing images that you have not added to your website project, or if you need to define registry values.

Web Setup Projects are not automatically built when you build or run your website. You must manually select the Web Setup Project in Solution Explorer and choose Build. You can do so by right-clicking the project or by using the Build menu. When you build the setup project, Visual Studio validates your code in the website. It then builds an MSI file and packages each element of your site in the MSI. You can follow the build process in Visual Studio in the Output window (View | Output). The script in the Output windows shows you each step and where the MSI file is generated. By default, the file is placed in the folder that contains your solution file. Figure 8-18 shows an example of a process as shown in the Output window.