move data and files and test before moving domain name?

  • audg

    (@audg)


    13 years, 4 months ago

    Hi,

    I was helping someone out, and set up a wordpress blog on my server with one of my own domain names to get their site ready.

    Now they are ready to move it to their own new hosting account.

    They currently have a live site (non-wordpress) so I don’t want to move the domain name until I am sure that everything is working properly on their new site.

    So I’ve moved all of the data and files to the new hosting account, but there is no domain name associated with it.

    So how can I be sure that it works before moving their domain from their live site? I assume that you can’t just use an ip address?

    I was thinking of moving another domain over, temporarily, to the new site to test that, and then switch domain names once I was sure it was working.

    I searched for a solution in the forums but couldn’t come up with anything.

    Your help greatly appreciated.

Viewing 12 replies - 1 through 12 (of 12 total)
  • Moderator t-p

    (@t-p)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    documentation:

    http://codex.wordpress.org/Changing_The_Site_URL
    http://codex.wordpress.org/Moving_WordPress

    Thread Starter audg

    (@audg)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    Thanks. I did follow the directions in Moving_WordPress. But I don’t have a domain name yet. I will try using the IP address. If that doesn’t work, I will try moving a ‘dummy’ domain name over to test, and then move the real one in its place.

    govpatel

    (@govpatel)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    You can upload wordpress in a folder of their domain name and test it out then just move their live site in a folder just in case they want to use it in future and move wordpress to root.

    Thread Starter audg

    (@audg)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    Thanks for the reply.

    They are actually switching to a whole new hosting account on a different server, so I can’t do that.

    I tried a fresh install of wordpress (not even using their content) and it does not work on the new server. That is, I can see the admin panel, but the page appears to be blank.

    Do you have any suggestions? Is it because a domain name is not pointing to this site yet?

    Terri Tutich

    (@torlowski)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    Usually the hosting company sends an email with the temporary access info – maybe something like the server ##.##.###.##/~username. Did you set up the new hosting account or did your client? Who’s address is the contact address for the hosting account? Look for this email and it should ahve the temporary access URL. or contact the hosting company and ask for it. Then you can check everything’s working before updating DNS for the domain name.

    Thread Starter audg

    (@audg)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    Thank you for the reply. The client set up the hosting account, and sent me the login info. They did provide me with an ip address, which I entered into the WordPress admin panel under Settings/General, both for wordpress address and site address. The install is in the root of the site. But even with a fresh and unmodified WordPress install, although I could connect to the database fine, (which let me know wp-config.php was OK) all of my pages were coming up blank.

    I can browse to the site using the ip address they provided me, and I can pull up a static html page, but I still cannot get the wordpress content to display.

    So 24 hours ago I moved one of my spare domain names over to the new site’s dns, just to see if that would help. It’s been 24 hours and the name is still not resolving.

    So I am going to give it 24 more hours and then contact the hosting company for support.

    Unless you have any other suggestions. I will try anything!

    Terri Tutich

    (@torlowski)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    Is there a static HTML index page in the root directory? I’ve had issues with this sometimes. You may want to try removing the static index page(s) and try to bring it up again.

    Can you provide a link to the site? Might be able to get more info from there…

    Thread Starter audg

    (@audg)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    Thanks for your help.

    There is no static html page. There is the _vti_inf.html file for front page, but that’s all.

    The ip address is: http://140.174.68.155/

    The domain name is: http://www.dirtfactory.com. I initiated the dns transfer about 36 hours ago, and it is still not resolving.

    When I bring up the wp-admin folder the url is:
    http://140.174.68.155/wp-login.php?redirect_to=http%3A%2F%2F140.174.68.155%2Fwp-admin%2Findex.php&reauth=1

    I was going to change the site address to dirtfactory as soon as it resolved.

    Thank you so much.

    Terri Tutich

    (@torlowski)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    I would say that it’s not because of the domain name – the IP address thing should work, especially if you can get to the admin page.

    Google search brought up a few possibilities –

    • make sure your functions.php is good (or try it with a blank one
    • make sure you’re pointing to the right db – do you maybe have more than one site pointing to the same db?
    • wipe the db and reinstall
    • re-create wp-config.php & upload, in case it got corrupted
    • check to make sure a valid theme is in use – sometimes I’ve gotten a smiliar error after changing theme name or something, and needed to reselect theme in Appearance settings
    Thread Starter audg

    (@audg)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    Thanks for those suggestions. I just tried a brand new theme and had same results. I also reloaded wp-config with same results.

    It’s a brand new site so there’s only one db.

    Tomorrow, I will wipe everything and start afresh. Then contact the hosting support.

    Maybe I’ll try installing in a subdirectory to see if that makes a difference.

    Thanks again for all of your suggestions! I truly appreciate the help. I’ll let you know when I get to the bottom of this. Hopefully it wasn’t something idiotic on my part that is escaping me.

    Audg

    Terri Tutich

    (@torlowski)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    Yes, please do let us know what the resolution is. It would be good to have in the “bag of tricks” if someone else ever runs into this issue.

    Thread Starter audg

    (@audg)

    13 years, 4 months ago

    This is definitely one for the bag of tricks: I had to alter index.php.
    From
    require(‘./wp-blog-header.php’);
    To
    require(‘wp-blog-header.php’);

    Think this will cause problems later?

Viewing 12 replies - 1 through 12 (of 12 total)
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