Production deployment to EC2 with minimal downtime
- by jensendarren
I have a simple web application deployed on a large instance with EC2. I now want to deploy the latest code to this server but I want to do this in a way which minimizes downtime and is a smooth as possible for the end user. Here is my plan:
Fire up another large instance
Install all the software layers on that instance
Restore and attach an EBS drive to the instance
Deploy our latest production ready code on the new instance
Run all tests (including manual testing of the application)
(If tests pass) Put a "Site Under Maintenance" notice on the live site.
Backup the EBS instance on the live site
Detach the EBS instance from the new server and replace with the latest backup
Use ec2-associate-address to move the IP address to the new instance
Sit back and wait for traffic to start flowing though the new instance
Terminate the old instance
Does this seem like a good strategy? Are there any tutorials or books that might cover this topic? I have already read Cloud Application Architectures by George Reese, which is an excellent book, but does not cover deployment. Additionally, I know that there are tools that can help with this like RightScale or enStratus which I will use when I start using more than one instance.