# Capistrano on Windows **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [April 20, 2006, 12:23am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/capistrano-on-windows/58251 "2006-04-20T00:23:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![casper\_the\_ghost](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/58956e/32.png) [@casper\_the\_ghost](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/casper_the_ghost)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2006, 12:23am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/capistrano-on-windows/58251/1 "2006-04-20T00:23:57Z")
So, I’ve just completed my first develop-test-deploy-wait -fix-test-deploy, and although it was successful it was a nightmare to carry out. Aside from not knowing that sqlite doesnt have a facility to delete columns from tables, the whole operation reeked of “hacked,” with multiple command windows open while I sprinted back and forth between my dev machine and the web server (luckily the app is on an intranet so I have physical access to the systems). Capistrano seems to be what I am looking for. However, not three paragraphs into the manual, I see: “The remote server is capable of understanding POSIX shell commands. (Windows, by default, does not fall into this category)…” This is highly discouraging, so much so that I skipped my normal procedure of doing a Google search for “[Cool Script/Program that doesnt work under Windows] under Windows.” I’m just tired of having to jump through hoops to acheive what it takes Unix users 2 seconds to do. From not ever getting “rake freeze\_gems” to work, to the absolute debacle that is rails+IIS/fastcgi/lighttpd/ISAPI (you’re telling me with a straight face that I need to install Apache to get rails working in IIS? WTF?) I’m extremely frustrated. I’m whining. Back to my original question. I want to implement Capistrano on my Windows-based setup. Am I wasting my time insofar as huge chunks of functionality will be unavailable or will I be able to utilize it in some sort of useful capacity? Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![casper\_the\_ghost](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/58956e/32.png) [@casper\_the\_ghost](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/casper_the_ghost)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2006, 1:28am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/capistrano-on-windows/58251/2 "2006-04-20T01:28:33Z")
A couple of quick things. I also have the mis-fortune of deploying on Windows, but I AM lucky enough to be able to use Apache, but that’s besides the point. First, I’m assuming you are already using Subversion, or at least CVS…right? Because these are your best friends when it comes to updating your apps. Your second best friend…migrations! =) These little guys are great and safe a load of time. I’m not sure how SQLite handles these, I use postgres, but I would think they are implemented for sqlite as well. So, with these to things in mind here’s my usual update process: (all from a terminal server so no sprinting involved:) ) Start -\> Run -\> Cmd `cd [to rails app]` `svn update` May or may not put up a maintenance message depending on the update and if my migrations would break anything. The good thing about this is that your models/controllers wont change until you restart the server, so that saves the ‘hurry up before someone reloads a page’ type deal, most of the time. `rake migrate` Do a graceful restart on Apache so it doesn’t interrupt any current users. And I’m done. This misses a couple things that capistrino would do for you, which again are a limitation of windows. First is the sym linking of directories for different versions and for your common files like logs. Second, you obviously would have to do this on all your servers by hand if you have some kind of cluster/load balancing scheme. This process though hasn’t really failed me yet, and lets me do small, incremental updates really quickly. It means I’m committing a lot more to SVN, but thats not a bad thing is it? 🙂 I know I’m a little OT here, but I think trying to re-implement Cap on windows would be a big pain in the arse, and would require more things installed, and have a better likely hood of having something in the chain breaking. I like to keep it as simple as possible. That being said, if I had a choice of running on a 'nix box, I would most definitely use Capistrino. -Nick ---
**Author:** ![casper\_the\_ghost](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/c/58956e/32.png) [@casper\_the\_ghost](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/casper_the_ghost)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2006, 4:55am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/capistrano-on-windows/58251/3 "2006-04-20T04:55:37Z")
Capistrano should work on Win32 systems, at least if you have Cygwin installed and are using Cygwin’s sshd, svn client and so on, since all it really does is log in via ssh and run a bunch of basic Unix-style commands remotely. You may need to spend a lot of time compared to most of us writing/customizing your Capistrano recipes and getting the Cygwin environment vars set properly and maybe figuring out how to best restart Apache from the commandline if you’re using services, but it seems as though it should work. Someone on the wiki mentioned it worked but that it definitely needs the cygwin svn client and reworked recipes. Lester Bangs wrote: > So, I’ve just completed my first develop-test-deploy-wait > -fix-test-deploy, > and although it was successful it was a nightmare to carry out. > Aside from not knowing that sqlite doesnt have a facility to delete > columns from tables, the whole operation reeked of “hacked,” with > multiple command windows open while I sprinted back and forth > between my dev machine and the web server (luckily the app is on > an intranet so I have physical access to the systems). > > Capistrano seems to be what I am looking for. However, not three > paragraphs into the manual, I see: > > “The remote server is capable of understanding POSIX shell > commands. (Windows, by default, does not fall > into this category)…” > > This is highly discouraging, so much so that I skipped my normal > procedure of doing a Google search for “[Cool Script/Program that > doesnt work under Windows] under Windows.” I’m just tired of > having to jump through hoops to acheive what it takes Unix users > 2 seconds to do. From not ever getting “rake freeze\_gems” to work, > to the absolute debacle that is rails+IIS/fastcgi/lighttpd/ISAPI (you’re > telling me with a straight face that I need to install Apache to get > rails working in IIS? WTF?) I’m extremely frustrated. > > I’m whining. Back to my original question. I want to implement > Capistrano on my Windows-based setup. Am I wasting my time > insofar as huge chunks of functionality will be unavailable or will I be > able to utilize > it in some sort of useful capacity? > > Thank you.