A real copy, not a sandbox
The files and the database, at their own address, on the same platform with the same PHP version. A plugin that misbehaves on staging is a plugin that would have misbehaved on live.
Feature
Staging that's easy to manage
Every paid Pressy gets a second copy of the whole site, files and database, at an address of its own. It is free, it does not count against your plan, and what breaks there is what would have broken in front of your customers.
At a glance
- Free, and outside your plan
- Both directions, whole-site
- Staging has its own backups
- Three things it cannot do
Push live takes a backup first
And if that backup fails, the push is cancelled rather than attempted anyway. You don't end up with a half-copied site because a disk was busy at the wrong moment.
The whole dashboard switches over
One control turns PHP, databases, cron and files into the staging copy's version of themselves. Billing, domains and settings stay read-only there, because they belong to the real Pressy.
The specifics
- Free, and outside your plan
- The copy is not billed and its storage is not counted against yours. A host charging for staging is charging you to store a second copy of something you already pay to store.
- Both directions, whole-site
- Sync down pulls live over staging when you want to start again from what is actually running. Push live sends it the other way. Both move files and database together.
- Staging has its own backups
- Same schedule, same on-demand button, same 30 days. The safety net does not stop at the edge of the live site.
- Three things it cannot do
- It cannot show you a diff of the two copies, move a single page, or keep itself out of search engines. The screen says so plainly rather than letting you find out.
The questions people ask
Does staging count against my plan?
No. It is a second copy on the same Pressy, it costs nothing extra, and its storage is not counted against the storage you bought.
What happens to my live site while I work on staging?
Nothing at all. It keeps serving visitors the whole time. Staging is a separate address, and nothing moves between the two until you press push live yourself.
Can I push just one page or one plugin?
No, and the screen tells you before you start rather than after. Sync down and push live are whole-site operations covering files and database together. Anything smaller than that, you do by hand.
The other five
The rest of what people switch for. The whole list is on the features page.
Try it before your customers do
Staging is on every paid Pressy from the first day, at every size, at no extra cost.