Generate Test Environment

this forum doesnt allow signatures, just an FYI (especially sigs that advertise sites):

https://www.ads-software.com/support/topic/68664?replies=6

I keep a test environment on my flash drive. This way, it’s entirely separate from all of my “live” sites and can be blown away and re-created on a whim with minimal effort.

An upside to using a portable test environment: doing this allows me to test my themes on multiple versions of WordPress. I currently have versions 2.3, 2.5, 2.6, and 2.7 installed, and try to make my themes backwards compatible for all (or for what I can, feasibility and time permitting). ??

Yikes, it’s just my personal blog. OK, not sure if that’s my sig. The portable test environment sounds intimidating. I’m pretty close to my capacity on mega-fast IT learning right now. I’d be really happy if I could just duplicate the whole site to dev.domainname.xyz, with everything exactly the same…then I could mess around.

Maybe I can accomplish the same thing with the flash drive solution, but whew, sounds intimidating. It would be cool, if I could just backup my whole site with plugins, a new DB, everything, let’s say every week, or even every evening. Then, if I did anything silly and the whole site just went kaplunk, I could just go to dev.domainname.xyz and bring my site back.

exactly what im looking for

this seems like an amazing plugin . . . does anything along these lines exist?

actually i just found an awesome plugin for this called test drive theme, i think its just what i was looking for

Theme test drive just lets you test themes. I’m talking about a complete replicated environment with a new DB and everything. You could use it as a backup or to create a test environment. A lot of all-night, sweaty, nervous, “my site is BROKEN OMG!” situations would be saved, and the collective anxiety of WP users would be significantly reduced. Yes, we’d be an even happier, more relaxed, and of course, mega-cool bunch!

Best,
Dainis

Setting up a test environment is pretty simple. I run one (actually several) locally using XAMPP.

1. Install XAMPP on a windows box. Run the apache and mysql parts of it, then open the browser to localhost to make sure it’s up and running.
2. Fresh install of WordPress on the test site. Make sure you select it to be private, not indexed by search engines. This will prevent WordPress from pinging out all your test posts and such.
3. Export your live site, import it to the test one. Using the WP export and import functionality, this gets attachments and comments and a bunch of other stuff from your live site.
4. Copy all your plugins and themes from your live site to the test one. Activate them all. This may take a while to get them all reconfigured properly.

Now you have a local copy of your site with some of your posts and such. Plenty enough to test changes with.

There’s no easy way to automate creation of a test site however. Too much changed between the two. But making a new local site with the same content/plugins/themes is quite possible, so you can test changes before rolling them to your live site.

OK, don’t have XAMPP and don’t have a windows box.

I guess it’s about where things point to and how WP is coded.

How about this:
1) Make TestWP DB

2) Copy

domainname.com/livesite
onto
domainname.com/testsite

(all plugins move along)

2) surf to testsite and switch the DB toTestWP

3) Export content from livesite and import into testsite

Would that work?

Another question is, can I just copy all of my plugins over even from livesite? What I mean here is, do I need to install each plugin from the source files or can I use the ones currently “enabled” at my livesite, by just copying those files on my livesite server? Just that question could save a bundle of time.

Cheers,
Dainis

“generate Test Environment” in a subdomain would be an excellent time saving and life saving plugin. That’s one I’d donate to no problem!