X-Cart forums

[Panther]

Hi All,

I have purchased a template from 7Dana.com for my version of X-Cart. I was wondering if there was a trick, hint or tip to view this new template on my current website without messing up my website's look right now a I have a live store running. I'm interested in seeing what it will look like and the work I will need to do before I implement the new template. I'm hoping this is something I can do to save me a little money.

Thanks for any advice you can give ahead of time.

[cflsystems]

Create dev site, apply template there, make any modifications you need, upload the dev site over the live one

[Panther]

I'm not sure how I would do that. Wouldn't I have to make duplicate of everything (databases, etc.)?

[cflsystems]

Yes you will have to create new database for it too. Just create new subdirectory in your existing xcart installation - say dev-store. Create new db - dev-store. Install xcart in dev-store directory and connect to dev-store db. Make sure you close the dev-store and disallow access in robots. txt so it's not accessible.

[Panther]

How do I disallow robots?

Thanks

[cflsystems]

Create robots.txt file in root of the dev site and put this inside

User-agent: *
Disallow: /

Note that not all search engines respect robots.txt
You can also restrict access in .htaccess to only the IP address you will be connecting from

[Panther]

Which file(s) do I need to modify to look at my copy database? and not my original?

Thanks in advance.

[cflsystems]

Edit config.php - you will need to change db name and also where cart is located as you will have it now in subdirectory

[Panther]

In the config.php file are the below sections the correct sections to change? I don't want to change something that doesn't need to be changed.

Route to dev_store folder:

#$xcart_http_host ="my IP Address";
#$xcart_https_host ="my IP Address";
#//$xcart_web_dir ="";
#$xcart_web_dir ="/mydomainname/dev_store";

For dev_store database:

# $sql_host ='localhost';
# $sql_user ='dev_store database name';
# $sql_db ='dev_store database name';
# $sql_password ='mypassword';

Thanks

[cflsystems]

$xcart_http_host ="my IP Address";
$xcart_https_host ="my IP Address";
$xcart_web_dir ="/dev_store";


$sql_host ='localhost';
$sql_user ='database username';
$sql_db ='dev_store database name';
$sql_password ='mypassword';