Web Deployment Projects, Web Application Projects and aspnet_merge.exe
aspnet_merge.exe exited with code 1 - read on... There are a few good articles around that describe the differences between the default Web project in VS2005, and Web Application Projects (which are included with SP1 now). Having come from custom scripts using XCOPY in VS 2003 - I was comfortable with the Web Application Project model - knowing that the site would be compiled into a single DLL which along with all the required files to run the site - could just be copied/XCOPYd/FTPd into production.