There are two ways in which VSTS can be configured to execute releases:
- Scheduled release
- Continuous deployment
We have been discussing continuous deployment in this chapter, and the next section talks about scheduled releases.
A scheduled release refers to automatic release pipeline execution at a predetermined schedule. Multiple schedules can be configured for each release pipeline and can include multiple source repositories. The release pipeline will execute at a given schedule and is not dependent on changes done to the code in the repository. These types of release pipelines are generally used on weekends during off-hours when generally there is no activity on the repository. The scheduling of a release is shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3: Scheduled release pipeline
In Figure 3, a release has been scheduled to run at 3 a.m. on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday.