AWS CodeDeploy vs Deployer

AWS CodeDeploy automates application releases across development, test, and production environments. It deploys to Amazon EC2, AWS Fargate, AWS Lambda, and on-premises instances using in-place, canary, or blue/green methods. Rolling updates and deployment health tracking help limit disruption; when too many updates fail, CodeDeploy can stop a deployment and restore a previous revision. Teams can launch and monitor releases through the AWS Management Console, CLI, SDKs, or APIs. AWS CodePipeline and some AWS partners offer prebuilt CI/CD connections. For EC2, CodeDeploy works with Auto Scaling and can update an instance before it joins an Elastic Load Balancing load balancer. Amazon SNS can send deployment-event notifications by SMS or email. The service uses a file- and command-based installation model with an AppSpec configuration file and is platform and language agnostic. EC2 deployments have no additional CodeDeploy charge; on-premises updates cost $0.02 per instance update, with no minimum fees or upfront commitments. On-premises instances must connect to public AWS service endpoints. The free plan is listed at free.

Deployer is a PHP deployment tool for sending applications to servers. It switches releases through atomic symlinks, so a deployment does not expose an incomplete state, and a failed release can be reverted with one command. The command line can list releases and return to the latest good release. Tasks run concurrently across selected hosts by default, with an option to limit concurrency. Projects describe hosts and tasks in deploy.php or deploy.yaml files and may add custom build tasks. Recipes cover Laravel, Symfony, WordPress, Drupal, Magento, CakePHP, CodeIgniter, Yii, Contao, Shopware, TYPO3, and Sulu. Deployer connects over SSH, can open an interactive SSH session, and includes a recipe for provisioning Ubuntu with firewall, PHP, database, and HTTPS configuration. Installation is available through Composer, Phive, a PHAR bundle, or Docker. CI/CD guidance covers GitHub Actions, GitLab CI/CD, and Bitbucket Pipelines. It is free and open source, with Linux, macOS, API, and self-hosted options.