{
  "id": 34173,
  "title": "'Deploy succeeded.' Four of my nine pages were still 404.",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/02/deploy-succeeded-four-of-my-nine-pages-were-still-404",
  "topic": "tech",
  "section": "Tech",
  "published": "2026-08-02T07:43:00.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "Dev.to",
    "slug": "dev-to",
    "url": "https://dev.to/fromzerotoship/deploy-succeeded-four-of-my-nine-pages-were-still-404-5bke"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "On a particular day this week, I made nine new pages and utilized a CLI tool to deploy them. The tool responded with a message confirming the success of the upload, stating the process took only 5.61 seconds to complete. However, upon checking the actual URLs, I discovered that four of the nine pages were still not accessible, displaying a 404 error.\n\nInitially, I found it problematic when only four out of nine pages were accessible after deployment. I realized that the deploy tool only confirms the successful completion of the upload and acceptance by the platform, but it doesn't provide any information about the accessibility of the pages. This realization led me to consider the questions the tool can answer versus the questions I needed to know the answer to.\n\nThe issue stemmed from trusting the deploy tool's report without verifying the actual accessibility of the pages. I learned that the deploy tool only confirms whether the upload was completed and accepted, but it doesn't indicate whether the pages are reachable or if what is live matches my expectations. It's crucial to recognize that the tool provides a narrow answer to one specific question and may not address all the concerns I had.\n\nTo overcome this limitation, I decided to take additional steps. I built a script that deliberately refuses to produce a result when it cannot reach enough of its data. The script performs tests and reports what it missed, providing an exit status of 1 if the test fails. This approach helped me identify that only 28% of the records were reached, and the process exited with status 1. By running this script, I was able to detect that the deployment was not as successful as initially thought.\n\nFurthermore, I implemented a monitoring technique to check the accessibility of the pages after deployment. I scheduled a loop that repeatedly checks the HTTP status code of each page. If any page returns a status code other than 200, indicating a 404 error, the script identifies it as a propagation issue rather than a broken build. This approach allowed me to differentiate between a failed deployment and a situation where the pages simply hadn't propagated yet.\n\nBy asking the right questions and verifying the accessibility of the pages, I gained a more accurate understanding of the deployment's success. The lesson learned is that relying solely on the deploy tool's report can lead to misinterpretation of the results. It is essential to ask additional questions, verify the actual accessibility of the pages, and obtain information from sources outside the control of the deployment process. This approach ensures a more comprehensive understanding of the deployment's outcome and helps avoid false conclusions based on incomplete information.",
  "summary": "In a recent deployment, four out of nine pages failed to become accessible after the deployment process was reported as successful. The Dev.to article highlights the importance of understanding the limitations of deployment tools and the need for additional monitoring to ensure that the pages are actually reachable. The author emphasizes that the deployment tool's response only confirms the upload's completion and acceptance by the platform, without guaranteeing that the pages are accessible to users. This situation serves as a reminder that successful deployment does not necessarily equate to successful visibility, and additional checks are necessary to ensure that the intended changes are reflected for end-users.",
  "key_points": [
    "Deploy tool confirmed upload success but not page accessibility",
    "Four out of nine pages still returned 404 error after deployment",
    "Script built to identify missing records and exit with status 1"
  ],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": "https://urgent.news/ill/34173.png",
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 2,
    "also_reported_by": [
      {
        "outlet": "Techmeme",
        "title": "Four US states rolled back or paused data center tax incentives, and nine others are weighing repeal measures, potentially adding 7% or more to equipment costs (Ann Davis Vaughan/The Information)",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/08/03/four-us-states-rolled-back-or-paused-data-center-tax-incentives-and",
        "published": "2026-08-03T00:10:01.000Z"
      }
    ]
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}