Deployment Procedures

Deployment principles and decision-making for safe production releases. Learn to THINK, not memorize scripts.

⚠️ How to Use This Skill

This skill teaches deployment principles, not bash scripts to copy.

• Every deployment is unique

• Understand the WHY behind each step

• Adapt procedures to your platform

1. Platform Selection

Decision Tree

What are you deploying? │ ├── Static site / JAMstack │ └── Vercel, Netlify, Cloudflare Pages │ ├── Simple web app │ ├── Managed → Railway, Render, Fly.io │ └── Control → VPS + PM2/Docker │ ├── Microservices │ └── Container orchestration │ └── Serverless └── Edge functions, Lambda

Each Platform Has Different Procedures

Platform Deployment Method

Vercel/Netlify Git push, auto-deploy

Railway/Render Git push or CLI

VPS + PM2 SSH + manual steps

Docker Image push + orchestration

Kubernetes kubectl apply

2. Pre-Deployment Principles

The 4 Verification Categories

Category What to Check

Code Quality Tests passing, linting clean, reviewed

Build Production build works, no warnings

Environment Env vars set, secrets current

Safety Backup done, rollback plan ready

Pre-Deployment Checklist

• All tests passing

• Code reviewed and approved

• Production build successful

• Environment variables verified

• Database migrations ready (if any)

• Rollback plan documented

• Team notified

• Monitoring ready

3. Deployment Workflow Principles

The 5-Phase Process

1. PREPARE └── Verify code, build, env vars

2. BACKUP └── Save current state before changing

3. DEPLOY └── Execute with monitoring open

4. VERIFY └── Health check, logs, key flows

5. CONFIRM or ROLLBACK └── All good? Confirm. Issues? Rollback.

Phase Principles

Phase Principle

Prepare Never deploy untested code

Backup Can't rollback without backup

Deploy Watch it happen, don't walk away

Verify Trust but verify

Confirm Have rollback trigger ready

4. Post-Deployment Verification

What to Verify

Check Why

Health endpoint Service is running

Error logs No new errors

Key user flows Critical features work

Performance Response times acceptable

Verification Window

• First 5 minutes: Active monitoring

• 15 minutes: Confirm stable

• 1 hour: Final verification

• Next day: Review metrics

5. Rollback Principles

When to Rollback

Symptom Action

Service down Rollback immediately

Critical errors Rollback

Performance >50% degraded Consider rollback

Minor issues Fix forward if quick

Rollback Strategy by Platform

Platform Rollback Method

Vercel/Netlify Redeploy previous commit

Railway/Render Rollback in dashboard

VPS + PM2 Restore backup, restart

Docker Previous image tag

K8s kubectl rollout undo

Rollback Principles

• Speed over perfection: Rollback first, debug later

• Don't compound errors: One rollback, not multiple changes

• Communicate: Tell team what happened

• Post-mortem: Understand why after stable

6. Zero-Downtime Deployment

Strategies

Strategy How It Works

Rolling Replace instances one by one

Blue-Green Switch traffic between environments

Canary Gradual traffic shift

Selection Principles

Scenario Strategy

Standard release Rolling

High-risk change Blue-green (easy rollback)

Need validation Canary (test with real traffic)

7. Emergency Procedures

Service Down Priority

• Assess: What's the symptom?

• Quick fix: Restart if unclear

• Rollback: If restart doesn't help

• Investigate: After stable

Investigation Order

Check Common Issues

Logs Errors, exceptions

Resources Disk full, memory

Network DNS, firewall

Dependencies Database, APIs

8. Anti-Patterns

❌ Don't ✅ Do

Deploy on Friday Deploy early in week

Rush deployment Follow the process

Skip staging Always test first

Deploy without backup Backup before deploy

Walk away after deploy Monitor for 15+ min

Multiple changes at once One change at a time

9. Decision Checklist

Before deploying:

• Platform-appropriate procedure?

• Backup strategy ready?

• Rollback plan documented?

• Monitoring configured?

• Team notified?

• Time to monitor after?

10. Best Practices

• Small, frequent deploys over big releases

• Feature flags for risky changes

• Automate repetitive steps

• Document every deployment

• Review what went wrong after issues

• Test rollback before you need it

Remember: Every deployment is a risk. Minimize risk through preparation, not speed.