What is a Development Environment?
For the latest version of Commerce Server 2007 Help, see the Microsoft Web site.
Developers use Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 or Visual Studio 2008 to create and update components and site code in the development environment. Developers work with the following types of content:
Commerce Server pipelines
COM+ components and applications
BizTalk Server adapters
Project Creation Wizard (PCW)
Internet Server Application Programming Interface (ISAPI) filters and extensions
Dynamic content such as ASP.NET pages and Visual Basic scripts
Static content such as HTML pages and graphics
Database schemas
Data in catalogs, campaigns, user profiles, and site terms
The following figure shows how multiple developers can work together to build a Commerce Server solution.
.gif "Development Environment for Commerce Server")
In general, you will work together with other developers to build a Web site based on Microsoft Commerce Server 2007. Multi-developer Commerce Server environments exhibit the following characteristics:
Developers each have an installation of Commerce Server on their development computers, including Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 or Visual Studio 2008 and the client-side of a source control system such as Microsoft Visual SourceSafe.
The installations of Commerce Server on the development computers all use a shared Commerce Server Repository (Microsoft SQL Server database). This repository handles check-in and check-out functionality for the resources under development, and otherwise handles multi-user access to the database.
The source control system server maintains resource files and any other file-based assets for use on the Web site. Developers follow standard procedures for checking such file-based assets out of and back into the source control system server.
Developers use a shared integration server, on which Commerce Server is installed and which is connected to the shared Commerce Server Repository, to periodically get the latest versions of the file-based assets and confirm that the combination of work performed by the various developers works together as anticipated.
A staging or test environment is typically part of the overall environment. At a well-defined time, the Commerce Server Repository that the developers use is deployed to the test environment, as well as the latest versions of the file-based assets and the Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS) infrastructure, such as virtual directories.
The directory structure of the site, including the root drive, should be the same on all developer computers; for example, <drive>:\inetpub\wwwroot\MySite. You must configure this directory as an application in IIS.
Commerce Server Staging (CSS) provides functionality to deploy the Commerce Server Repository from one server to one or more other servers. You can also use CSS to deploy the file-based and IIS infrastructure assets of the Web site.
Prior to deployment to a production environment, you should thoroughly test the new version of the Web site in the test environment.
See Also
Other Resources
What are the Hardware Deployment Requirements?