Deployment Portal
The deployment portal is what your customer's admin opens when you send them a deployment link. It's a white-labeled web page — your logo, your name, your accent color — that walks them through installing your application into their cloud.
Alien generates the portal automatically from your project. Every release rebuilds the four artifacts the portal serves (CLI, Terraform, CloudFormation, Helm) so the customer always gets the current version. You don't write or host any of it.
Deployment methods
The portal presents four methods. The customer picks whichever fits their workflow — they all produce the same result.
| Method | What it is | When the customer picks it |
|---|---|---|
| CLI | A project-branded binary (e.g. acme-deploy) | They want one command, smallest blast radius |
| Terraform | A module dropped into their existing workspace | Their platform team already uses Terraform |
| CloudFormation | A one-click stack launch via the AWS console | They want zero CLI, AWS-only |
| Helm | Chart that installs the agent into their cluster | Their target is Kubernetes |
The CLI, Terraform, CloudFormation, and Agent image are all branded with your project name and logo. Configure naming under Settings → Packages.
What the customer sees
Each tab in the portal renders project-branded instructions for that method. The portal:
- Reads project status (release version, supported platforms) live
- Embeds the deployment token directly in commands — no copy-paste of secrets
- Shows the required cloud permissions at the top of each method
- Surfaces resource-by-resource progress once the customer kicks off the deploy
Portal Studio
Customize the portal under Settings → Deployment Portal in the dashboard. The Portal Studio is a side-by-side editor — controls on the left, live preview on the right, updates as you type.
| Field | Effect |
|---|---|
| Logo | PNG/JPEG/WebP/SVG, max 1 MB. Falls back to your workspace logo. |
| Title | Replaces "Deploy <project>" in the header. |
| Subtitle | Smaller line under the title — good for a tagline or contact line. |
| Preset | Visual tone: Clean (default), Technical, Enterprise, Playful, or Minimal. |
| Accent color | Blue, purple, green, orange, pink, or slate — used for buttons and links. |
| Density | Comfortable or compact. |
| Support URL | "Need help?" link shown to the customer. |
| Docs URL | "View docs" link shown to the customer. |
Custom domain
By default, portal links use alien.dev/deploy/#<token>. For a fully branded experience, point a domain you control — e.g. deploy.acme.com — at the portal.
Configure under Settings → Deployment Portal → Portal domain. The dashboard guides you through the DNS records; TLS is auto-provisioned.
After cutover, every new deployment link uses the custom hostname.
Tokens
Each link carries a short-lived deployment token. Tokens are scoped to a single deployment group and bound to a maximum deployment count (default 100). They're meant to be hand-held to the customer's admin — treat them like passwords.
Mint new tokens with alien onboard <name>, or from the dashboard under Deployments → New deployment. Old tokens stop working immediately when a new one is minted from the same deployment group.
GCP OAuth
If your project deploys to GCP, the portal walks the customer's admin through granting cross-account access via OAuth. You can either use the shared Alien OAuth app (zero setup, branding shows "Alien") or register your own for a fully-branded consent screen.