VSTS - Deployment Group release not working: Unable to deploy to the target as the target is offline

Question

I am using Deployment Groups in VSTS to deploy my application to an on premise test web server. It has been working fine for a long time, but after having not used it for about 6 weeks I am now getting this error which I would like to fix;

Answer 1

Your agent is not running or it does not have access to reach VSTS.

Check your agent status on the deployment group configuration.

Check if the agent is running on your server, searching on Windows Services for VSTS Agent. It will have the name appended to the name of the service. Start it if it is not running and go back to deployment groups to see if it is online. It not, it could be your firewall.

If nothing else works, try to reinstall the agent. It is some configuration issue.