Staging on Raidboxes 2.0 Boxes
If you want to run staging on a Box that already located on the new Raidboxes 2.0 infrastructure, you will find a separate article on the staging function.
With our staging feature, you can create a development environment for one of your Boxes. This allows you to test plugin and theme updates, new designs and functions for your website without any risk to your live site. When you're happy with the changes, simply push them from your staging environment to your live site with a single click.
Important: The staging environment shares server resources with your live site and has the PHP version and WP versions. If your website is running under WP 6.1, for example, you cannot independently upgrade to WP 6.2 in the staging environment. The same applies to PHP 8.1. If you want to test PHP 8.1, please use a new Demo Box or clone your current Box into a new Box.
Activate staging
To activate staging, click on Staging in your Raidboxes Dashboard. This will take you to the Staging menu for your Box where you can activate the staging environment.
Important: The staging environment is created on the same server as your live site. This means you need to have sufficient available memory to activate staging. If you don't have enough memory available, please contact our support or reduce the SSD usage of your live website.
Please note that your staging environment is not backed as part of our backup feature. If you want to create a backup of your staging site, please use an alternative method.
After you activate staging, it will take a moment before the staging environment is ready to use. Once the process is complete, you can access the actual staging menu.
How staging works
At Raidboxes, your staging site is tracked via a cookie. When you delete your cookies, you will automatically switch from the staging site to the live site.
Also note that the staging cookie has a fixed lifetime of two hours. As long as you are actively working in the staging environment, this is not a problem – the lifetime will be extended automatically. After a longer period of inactivity or absence, however, you should definitely check whether you are still in the staging environment. You can easily recognize this by the orange banner, which is usually located in the lower-right corner of your browser's viewport.
No caching in the staging environment
Please note that the Raidboxes cache is always disabled for the staging environment.
How to manage your staging environment
Every staging site has its own database, file system and log files.
Staging database: You can access the staging database from the Staging menu. Simply go to the section MySQL-Database and click on Access.
SFTP access: The staging environment of your Box has its own file system that is stored along with the file system of your live website. The FTP access data is located in the Staging menu in the section SFTP.
Log files: To allow you to analyze events in the staging environment independently of your live website, every staging environment has its own log files. You can find these in the Staging menu in the section Log files.
How to work with staging
Your staging site looks and behaves just like your live website. To enter the staging environment, click on Login from the Staging menu.
This will take you to the staging environment. An orange banner in the front end as well as in the WordPress dashboard signifies you are in the staging environment.
You can minimize the banner by clicking on it. You can also move the banner around on your screen to keep it from covering important control elements. If you click on Exit staging, you'll be directed back to your live website.
Log in to your WordPress dashboard to make and test changes to your site risk free.
Share your staging link
You can test your staging site at any time in other browsers and share the staging link with third parties. Just click on the share icon next to Login and send the link to your customers or colleagues.
Push staging changes live
Once you've made the desired changes in the staging environment, you can push them from staging to live with a single click. This rewrites your live website with the content of your staging environment. The staging site will not be deleted during the live push. Please make a backup of your live site before pushing any changes live.
If you don't want to rewrite all content on your live website, use the Expert mode for staging. This mode allows you to define exactly which files and database tables should or should not be overwritten.
Deactivate staging
If you want to deactivate staging, simply toggle the Staging button to OFF.