Is there an option to create a "Test Site" and move it to the live directory when complete?

This is exactly what I did. I had a static site and when I installed the CMS software (which is in it's own directory) it had absolutely no effect on the existing site. From then on because the new pages I was building had .php extensions and the existing ones had .htm ones there was no chance of a file name clash. Then when I was ready to go live I just renamed home.php to index.php and removed index.htm ... and DONE!

awesome. This is VERY very helpful. Thanks so much!

On a similar note:

What if the client has yet to determine/decide on a web host or url? Would there be any any any way to create the whole thing on our own test server, and "move" the entire thing upon completion?

We usually are able to get the url/host nailed down early on, but sometimes not...

Would this be nearly impossible -- or more doable than i imagine? (As there's a database/MySQL thing associated with it, etc. Seems like it would be quite troublesome to uproot and transplant it. right?) It's just a little fuzzy in my mind what all 'happens' when the CMS Builder is "installed" I guess. :)

Thanks again!

Hi gagester

The main thing to keep in mind if you know you are going to be moving to a new server is to make sure all URLs you use on your templates are relative to the webroot and don't have your domain name in them.

So you would want something like this:

<a href="/thisPage.php">

instead of something like this:

<a href="http://www.mysite.com/thisPage.php">

The other thing is that it is quite easy to move CMS Builder itself from server to server if you don't need to worry about the data.

When you are ready to do the server move, we'll walk you through it.

Let me know if you need anymore detail for now :).

This is very helpful. Thanks much!

One question though: when you say that it's "quite easy to move CMS Builder itself from server to server if you don't need to worry about the data."

what do you mean be not worrying about the data? Would we be able to build the ENTIRE site, fill it with the right content, images, etc, via the admin and move it at that point -- when it's 100% ready to go live?

The MySQL would have to be moved at that point also, right? (I have very limited understanding of the whole MySQL thing... and how exactly they "link.") [crazy] Any pointers?

Hi gagester

When you setup a copy of CMS Builder, you first create a bunch of sections, and then add a bunch of articles and other content to these sections.

Moving CMS Builder and the sections you created over to a new server is really easy.

Moving the content that you added to your sections (images, text, etc.) will involve extra work.

If you are ok with entering your content again (and uploading the images again), then the server move will be quite easy. All the sections and things will be there.

Either way, you will also need to update a bit of code on each page you have CMS Builder on. We can go over all the details later. I want to make sure we are on the same page to start with for now :).

Let me know if this clears things up :).