Deploying Defang with Defang: Part 2
When we refreshed the Defang brand, we knew our website needed more than just a fresh coat of paint. It needed to become a more dynamic part of our stack. We needed some parts to be more flexible, some parts to be more interactive, and better aligned with how modern apps are organized and deployed. And what better way to take it there than to deploy it with Defang itself?
This is part of our ongoing "Defang on Defang" series, where we show how we're using our own tool to deploy all the services that power Defang. In this post, we're diving into how we turned our own website into a project to better understand how Defang can be used to deploy a dynamic Next.js apps and how we can improve the experience for developers.
From S3 + CloudFront to Dynamic, Containerized Deployments
Our original site was a Next.js app using static exports deployed via S3 and fronted by CloudFront. That setup worked for a while—it was fast and simple. But with our brand refresh, we added pages and components where it made sense to use (and test for other developers) some Next.js features that we couldn't use with the static export:
That meant static hosting wouldn't cut it. So we decided to run the site as an app in a container.
That being said, our learnings from the previous setup are being used to develop the capabilities of Defang. We're using the experience to make sure that Defang can handle the deployment of static sites as well as dynamic ones. We'll keep you updated when that's ready.