Tips for your next major deployment

Deployment is one of the most annoying steps in the software production process especially for developers. I hate it. A small missing configuration or permission can cause severe problems. worse can happen when applying a fix or an update.
I believe that software developers should not make the actual deployment. Software Implementors or system engineers are better at configuring things ;)

Here, I share some good points that can help making a peaceful deployment experience . Most of them apply mainly to web applications.

1. Write a good deployment guide and test it before you deploy on production
   
2. Create a brief yet complete check list.
3. Peer check your deployment: another implementor or developer should review the steps you made.
   
4. Automate the process of deployment as much as you can.
5. If you deploy on a production environment, backup live data and configurations. You should also take the application offline.
   
6. Use staging environments with the same configurations as the production servers.
7. Test your deployment.