@Debra

You are right. I am also very upset that We can’t use staging at SiteGround for SSL Sites 🙁

Regards

Hey Sean,

Thanks a lot. I did do a clean re-install of everything and the staging site is proving to be a boon because I can tear it apart and put it back together without touching any of the production processes. Great stuff!

I think I figured it out.

I was doing another test on a different staging site…which has exactly the same problem.

The significant difference for these two sites is, …drum roll please… neither of them has a registered domain.

I’m using a private domain name and private DNS (localhosts file) to access the EDD site.

So, my guess is that EDD is unable to access my site using the domain name…which makes perfect sense.

Sorry for the noise. I wonder if this is something that EDD might want to take into account?

Byron

Absolutely it can cause issues. Just delete (not deactivate) the plugins and reinstall them fresh if they’re not behaving correctly.

Hi Sean,

I mean the EDD plugins aren’t working as they are supposed to. Case in point, when I do make a purchase, it tells me that there is an issue with the Paypal email address. It’s weird because I actually have a stripe configuration in place (And I was simulating a free purchase). Which made me think if copying over the wp-content/plugins folder to my staging site might have broken something in EDD. I did make the relevant site name changes to my cloned database to make sure it was pointing to the new site (which it is, because I can see my old products and licenses as on the live site, which is great).

I just bought the manual purchases EDD plugin as well, and when I try to attribute a purchase it just shows a blank page, and the Payment history shows a ‘pending’ status.

However, short of opening a full blown support ticket, just wanted to know if you think copying over the content in my live site to my new site could have broken something internally? I tried deactivating licenses of all my plugins as well as kept them on with no difference.

Thanks again!

Abesh

Hi, Abesh!

What do you mean when you say you can’t make any test purchases?

Even if your clone copied things over for you, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with you deleting plugins and reinstalling them yourself. If something isn’t working properly, troubleshoot it freely… that’s what makes having a staging site so great. It doesn’t have to be an exact clone.

Thanks for the brilliant article. I have been guilty of not updating to the latest version of everything primarily because I have only one main site, and couldn’t afford something going wrong with a stray update. But I did put in some time today, and cloned everything onto a staging site and copied the db too. However, I can’t really test any of the plugins. Am I suppose to re-install EDD and activate it again? (My clone took care of the copy/paste of themes and other plugins), but while the site is working I can’t make any test purchases or anything. Anyone have any clue if I’m making some obvious blunder?

But thanks again for such a helpful post Sean!

Cheers
Abesh

No problem at all. Thanks for reading and commenting!

Yes indeed! A web host that understands WordPress is key. It took me a couple of years to realize this but I agree 100%.

Hi, Leah. Couple of things here…

First, please note that you do not have to have an exact clone of data for a staging site to be effective. While a database clone is the most thorough, it’s not necessary. That means you do not have to match the content of posts and pages on your staging site. It’s more about matching functionality. So duplicate content is not an issue in that case.

Secondly, WordPress has an option to prevent search engine from indexing content. Always do that on your staging site if it’s live (I stage my site locally instead of putting them online). Go to Settings -> Reading in your WordPress dashboard and you will see the “Search Engine Visibility” option.

“Live editing – and screwing up things – is more time consuming and nerve wrecking than follow these simple steps to create a staging site.”

Bingo! I couldn’t agree more. Thanks for reading and I appreciate the comment.

Hi Ralf,

No, you do not need additional license keys.

Again, great article! Looking forward to read more from you.

I use Siteground, and I love them – however, their staging site feature does not work with https (SSL version) websites. I’ve found that very frustrating!

Exactly. It’s definitely double work but if it’s done on a daily basis, it should only be a plugin or two at a time… which is best. A lot of people go weeks between bulk updates which is a recipe for disaster if something breaks. Definitely worth the extra work in my opinion!

Many thanks Sean. It sounds as if I need to do everything twice then… update all plugins etc on the staging site to test, and then if all seems OK, repeat the same on the live site.

Hi, Ben. I wouldn’t say that’s a problem. I know that many users like to try to move things from staging to live but I do not think that’s the best way to do things. Perhaps I shouldn’t really refer to it as a staging site then, it’s more of a testing site for me.

What I mean is that every thing you do on my test site is done in a theme, plugin, or code snippet. It stays packaged and organized. I use the testing site just to implement it and test. Once it’s approved, I implement it on the live site. I don’t ever transfer data directly from my test site to my live site… ever.

The only time I would even consider doing that is if maybe a plugin or theme allows me to export settings and then I can import them to the live site. But I certainly would be transferring posts, pages, downloads, etc. from the test site to the live site. Only live to test.

Thanks for the information, Byron. Forgive me, I didn’t know what you meant by “removed everything” so I needed to be sure. I understand it’s a staging site but it’s still worth looking into. Feel free to open up a support ticket and we can go from there. https://easydigitaldownloads.com/support/forum/basic/

As I mentioned, I removed everything. With only EDD installed (and no .htaccess), I see the message.

Since it’s my staging site, I’m not desperate to solve the problem….but I’m very confused about what could be blocking it.

I tried reinstalling WordPress also.

Byron

Do you have any type of security plugins installed? If so, deactivate them. See if that gets rid of the error.

Looks like a great resource!

That’s pretty cool, David. Never heard of it before. I’m a Mac user so I can’t try it out but looks like a nice resource for Windows users.

Thanks for reading and commenting!

When I remove everything and add only EDD back in, the message comes back.

Any thoughts on how to fix my staging site?

I’ve removed .htaccess also, so I don’t believe that contributes anything to the mix.

I use WordPress for my websites, a while ago I found “Instant WP” which enabled me to have a fully functional local WordPress without having to Install any software, as it has a full environment in the folder, I am not affiliated to Instant WP, it is just free to download and great to use for an off-line staging database

http://www.instantwp.com/

David

It’s one of those things that you may now realize is important until you need it. But I promise it’s better to create beforehand. Definitely worth adding to your workflow.

Thanks

I’ll admit that I haven’t always had a staging site either. In fact, I don’t have a staging site specific to any of my main sites. But of course, we don’t always need them if we know how to troubleshoot issues.

I have 5 local WordPress installs which are pretty much generic staging sites for any site I will ever work on. They cover general WordPress, EDD, my commercial WordPress framework, my released WordPress plugins, and WordPress trunk (for testing and contributing). Very rarely do I need a full, exact duplicate of a site.

For non-developers, though, it’s definitely important and a must-have. Thanks for reading and commenting, Sami!

I’ll admit that I’m guilty as charged for not having staging site. For me it’s basically money issue. My site is running on HHVM/nginx with SSL but I’m not allowed to install new installs of WP in the same server environment. I could install WP in other environment but testing would be pretty much useless. All that said, I don’t mind if my host will provide staging site at some point:)

Thanks for the comment! I’ve heard a lot of great things about SiteGround. Quite a few of our users use them. Hopefully, they’re all taking advantage of that feature. 🙂