How to Download a Live WordPress Site

reji99
(@reji99)

12 years, 2 months ago

Hey all,

I’ve got a wordpress site that I have been using for a year now and it is hosted with godaddy. I have got a new theme that I would like to use for the site, but I would like to test it offline first before making it LIVE.

The problem is previously I was always making changes to the LIVE site, usually at hours when I get little to no traffic. However, that has changed now and I do get traffic most hours through out a 24hr day.

So my problem is:

1. How do i download my existing website to my laptop and make those changes with new theme? (total newbie, sorry!)

2. I use a mac OSX 10.6.8, so not sure what I need to be doing to get the site working like a live site offline.

3. Once I have implemented the new changes, what is the best way to upload the site to the godaddy server without having any downtime or errors for site visitors?

Is there anything else I need to install or do inorder for this to work? I hope you can give me as much information as possible or any links to any guides or articles that explain how to do this.

Thanks so much for any help you can offer!!!

Viewing 5 replies - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)

Moderator keesiemeijer
(@keesiemeijer)

12 years, 2 months ago

read this:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Test_Driving_WordPress
http://codex.wordpress.org/Installing_WordPress_Locally_on_Your_Mac_With_MAMP

download a backup of your live site’s database
http://codex.wordpress.org/Backing_Up_Your_Database

Do step one to three from the MAMP link above and import your live site’s database in the newly created database: http://codex.wordpress.org/Restoring_Your_Database_From_Backup

Do step 4 rom the MAMP link above. Instead of downloading WordPress download all the files from the server. Make sure the (new) database info is correct in your wp-config.php.

database name is newly created local database name
database user is root
database password is root
database host/server is localhost

visit your site and login with password from the live site.

fonglh
(@fonglh)

12 years, 2 months ago

For question 1 and 2,
http://codex.wordpress.org/Installing_WordPress_Locally_on_Your_Mac_With_MAMP

For question 3,
http://codex.wordpress.org/Moving_WordPress

If you’re only changing the theme, you can just upload it and switch to it. If you still need to customize widgets and other stuff, then you’ll have to export the database from your test setup and import it to your live site. Note that this process will replace all the content on your live site with whatever was in your test site as well.

Thread Starter reji99
(@reji99)

12 years, 2 months ago

@ keesiemeijer

Hey mate, thanks for those tips! I’ve tried installing MAMP and have got stuck on the part where i have the option to “Open Start Page”. Tried googling everything but no luck so far. Any suggestions?

Also, are you able to do this as a professional service? If you were to do this for me, I’m happy to pay you for your time. I am quite new to this so perhaps you can guide me thru an IM like skype? My id is “reji99”.

Thanks again for all the tips.

Thread Starter reji99
(@reji99)

12 years, 2 months ago

Ok, after hours of messing around with MAMP, i’ve managed to fix the problem with the greyed out “Open Start Page”. Apparently MAMP runs several processes on mac OSX at times, where we need to kill it and restart MAMP. Anyways now I have the green lights on both servers and have also managed to copy my WP files from my hosting server to the local folder which is specified in Apache preferences.

However, I’m not able to access the WP Login, not sure what I am doing wrong.

This is the URL i’m using : http://localhost:8888/wordpress/wp-admin

Please help with any ideas or suggestions you have got as I’ve tried pretty much everything and no success.

Moderator keesiemeijer
(@keesiemeijer)

12 years, 2 months ago

also managed to copy my WP files from my hosting server to the local folder which is specified in Apache preferences.

I think with a url localhost:8888 you have to put the wordpress files in the htdocs folder inside the mamp folder and just go to http://localhost:8888/wp-admin/

Did you create a new database and imported the one from your site? Edited wp-config.php with the correct database values?

And sometimes if it’s not working close and start MAMP up again.

tutorial: http://wp.smashingmagazine.com/2011/09/28/developing-wordpress-locally-with-mamp/

Viewing 5 replies - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)

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How to Download a Live WordPress Site

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