Deploying ASP.NET Core application via FTP

[Jason Miller]

Hello! I'm fairly new to Pipelines and .NET Core and I'm trying to figure out how to build and deploy my application via FTP using Pipelines.

I currently have the following setup in my Pipelines .yml file and the build portion seems to be running just fine.

image: mcr.microsoft.com/dotnet/core/sdk:3.1

pipelines:
  default:
    - step:
      caches:
        - dotnetcore
      script:
        - export PROJECT_NAME=WebApplication
        - dotnet restore
        - dotnet build $PROJECT_NAME

I see there is an FTP pipe that can be added that looks pretty straightforward if being used with static files in my repo, but I'm unclear how to integrate this with my existing .NET Core build.

script:
  - pipe: atlassian/ftp-deploy:0.3.1
    variables: 
      USER: '<string>'
      PASSWORD: '<string>' 
      SERVER: '<string>' 
      REMOTE_PATH: '<string>'
      LOCAL_PATH: '<string>'
      DEBUG: '<boolean>'
      EXTRA_ARGS: '<string>'
      DELETE_FLAG: '<boolean>'

My first question would be: Can this FTP pipe run inside my existing script tag just below "dotnet build"? Or do I need to define a seperate step and set everything up there? And, in either scenario, how do I define my local path to point to wherever my .NET application is building too? As of right now I'm unclear where those build files live after the build completes.

Any assitance here will be much appricated and hopefully these are not completely stupid questions. Just trying to get my brain wrapped around this so I'm not manually uploading my app everytime.

Thanks!

[Jason Miller · Accepted solution]

Figured this out myself with some trial and error and digging through the logs a bit. Here is the working version of my pipelines config file in hopes this will help someone else out who is trying to use FTP with ASP.NET Core builds.

image: mcr.microsoft.com/dotnet/core/sdk:3.1

pipelines:
    branches:
        master:
            - step:
                caches:
                    - dotnetcore
                script:
                    - export PROJECT_NAME=WebApplication
                    - dotnet restore
                    - dotnet build $PROJECT_NAME
                    - pipe: atlassian/ftp-deploy:0.3.1
                        variables:
                            USER: $PROD_USERNAME
                            PASSWORD: $PROD_PASSWORD
                            SERVER: $PROD_FTP
                            REMOTE_PATH: $PROD_PATH
                            LOCAL_PATH: $BUILD_PATH

[Chihab Jraoui]

Thank you, that was helpful for me :)

[Jason Miller]

Hi @Chihab Jraoui, I'm glad this helped you out. One thing I ran into in my case that is not covered in this thread is that even though I was able to upload the new build via FTP, the DLLs remained loaded in memory on the server, so pushing a new build didn't update anything. If you control the server you can easily recycle the application pools, but in my case, it was a 3rd party hosting company that I had to submit a support ticket to get that done. I ended up finding a workaround by deleting all files, uploading an "app_offline.htm" file (which I guess tells IIS to release the app from memory), then upload the new build from there. I was not able to automate this in Pipelines (as of yet anyway) but was able to manually get the project deployed for my client without contacting support every time. I am hoping to double back on this when I have time to see if it can be fully automated.

[Chihab Jraoui]

I didn't run into this case yet, I'm trying to setup the pipelines to automate the workflow for my team. I will keep your advice in mind for sure. Thanks again.

[Varick Johnson]

Hi @Jason Miller  I'm exactly dealing with your case did you fully automated the pipeline ?is there any command to remove existing  files from server before pushing a new build?