Wondering . . . can I temporarily publish a half-built site in order to work on it with a person in another state? Just so they can see it and we can chat about further content.
Thank you!
Yes, of course you can. But itās dependent on how much āsecurityā or privacy you need.
If you need a lot of privacy then you may want to get Sitelok, or Joeās password stack, so the two of you have to login to see the site.
ā¦ that said, most of the time high security is not that important. If the real website is:
mysupersite.com
then just publish to something like:
mysupersite.com/draft
So that all the RW files are in the draft area. Later youāll need to change the published siteās location in RW back to: mysupersite.com
Thank you so much, Mathew. We have a domain name, but, as yet, no host. So, if I understand you correctly, we need to publish before we can get it online as /draft?
I went into the RW File menu and clicked on Preview Page in . . . , but only I seem to be able to see it.
Well, onward we go!
Kate,
In order for anyone else but you (who can, presumably, only see your content ālocallyā - on you machine at your desk) to see it, it has to be made available to them in one of two ways:
ā¢ you can publish it/upload it to a host, which youāll need to get first, and follow Mathewās instructions
ā¢ you can export it as HTML pages, zip up the files and send them to the other person.
(If that other person had RW and all the same images and Add-ons that you have used, then under some circumstances, you could also send them the RW source file.)
Mark, thanks Big-Time! That cleared it right up! We will wait until itās published. The pages arenāt many or long, so I can send our organizationās president screen shots.
I appreciate all the timely responses. And also Will Woodgateās generous help with my learning the Stacks 4Stacks RefinedSlider 2.
Cheers,
Kate
Very welcome, Kate. Good luck!
@Kate3 Glad Mark was able to help you out! If you need help choosing a hosting service let us know. I just assumed you already had that sorted out: my mistake.
Apologies for not being more clear. The choice of host is not wholly mine. Iām trying to finish the site while everyone else is running around BUSY, but wants it up! I think itās almost good to go, and once up, we can add. Itās for an environmental organization with very timely issuesāall of us working to save the planet, everyone out of their technical comfort zones.
Again, many thanks.
Thanks for the clarification. Choice of a hosting company is not a simple thing! And itās very important.
Many people, especially non-technical, will want to go with the cheapest provider. Thinking, mistakenly so, that all services are really the same.
Iād suggest opening a new thread and asking folks what service they recommend. Or especially do not recommend. You can also do a search on these forums re: recommending hosting services. There have been several past discussions about this topic.
Mark, yes, Iām actually aware of that aspect. But thanks for the specific suggestion. It can lend weight to my input with the org.
Iām off for the day. Will return here tomorrow.
Kate
Kate,
Good luck with your work. Itās needed more than ever, isnāt it 
.
Two hosting companies I can suggest as nearly perfect are Chillidog (which is endorsed by numerous folk here) and FutureQuest, which Iāve used since 2003 and never once had a single complaint about - their tech support is outstandingā¦ very security conscious and extremely reliable.
You can search the forum for hosting and find lots of posts and opinions.
Some things to look for:
- Free SSL certificates
- PHP version(s)
- multiple domains / sub domains
- bandwidth and space needed
- MySQL
- Complete Updated knowledge base.
- Support - 24/7, online chat, phone, or just support tickets and email
Iāve been using DreamHost lately and been very happy with them.
Thanks everyone for all the suggestions!
Iāve been cruising around reading reviews. Currently, our domain name is parked at Go-Daddy. Iām not too excited about that. They appear to have grown into a behemoth, and their CEO takes the money and hunts elephants. Whereas, DreamHost is admirably GREEN in myriad ways. Looks like they had a stellar reputation, until last year . . . since then, theyāve gotten all sorts of terrible reviews. Yet, that makes me wonder whether itās Go-Daddy peeps who are writing them? A sort of Walmart scheme of drive out the little guys and then raise the prices, which Go-Daddy gets complaints about. Sorry folks, to take this to the political level, but thatās where I live.
Chillidog receives high praise on this forum. And Iām leaning in its direction.
Soooo, a couple questions, while keeping in mind that weāre a continually underfunded small nonprofit, but smack in the legal arena, of suing gov agencies when they fail to protect our rivers, water quality, and endangered fisheries. First, regarding Chillidog: Is Greg becoming totally swamped now, staying up all night, no coffee strong enough to take care of us all? And . . . in checking his plans & pricing, itās a long jump from Shared to Puppy, and then to VPS and dedicated. I wonder how much security we needāin the way of SSL certificates and the coming change in https. E-gads! (The site will have no donation page; that goes thru our umbrella org. Only a contact page with email addresses.)
Lastly, are there any reflections on the current state of DreamHost?
ENOUGH, already!
You will need SSL, any page that excepts users input will get a not secure warning from the latest release of Chrome. If SERP (search engine results page) ranking matters then SSL helps.
As for go daddy, the only experience Iāve had is to move sites away from them. Go daddy seems like a good deal, but once you start using them, theyāll charge for everything as an extra.
Iāve been using DreamHost for a while and can say Iām quite happy with them. They meet all the criteria I outlined above, including 24x7 support.
Doug, thank you for sharing. Wondering yet, what level of hosting you would recommendāIām looking at the bottom-dollar shared or maybe the yearly-billed VPS? Seems like thereās a lot of feedback about NOT going with shared. But VPS is shared, also, just less so, right?
Mark, thanks. I read up on Chillidog. Thereās a good feel to the company. But it is a huge jump from basic-shared to the first level VPS. What level would you think weād need? We wonāt have a great deal of traffic, not selling anything, just trying to get the word out about our work and drum up donations to cover attorney travel expenses and basic operating. Weāre bare bones, a good board of directors, one annual āfunā-raiser bash, but no income from a membershipās annual dues, nor the staff to manage all that. I think we worry most about opposition hacking.
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Kate,
There are others here with lengthy experience of ChilliDog and Greg frequents these forums.
Honestly, Iāve heard nothing but good about the service.
Time after time, Greg has gone beyond the call of duty and sorted out - as far as I can see - every single problem that (potential) users have had.
If I were you, Iād ask him to help you decide.
At ask events, good luck with your work. Itās so necessary.
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VPS is shared, just with a small number of sites. Itās probably more a matter of expected traffic and budget. Even though many of the shared plans donāt meter bandwidth usage, there is a finite amount of bandwidth available, the more sites on a server, the more competition for that bandwidth. Usually, itās not an issue, as most sites on shared servers are vary low volume.
You can also use a service like CloudFlare that can cache your site, and serve your pages and resources from their global network of servers. This virtually eliminates any bottleneck on bandwidth at the host.
The one drawback to CloudFlare is you have to remember to clear the cache when you make changes.
With most hosting companies you can easily upgrade your plan at a later date.
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Hi Kate, if you have your own website you could just tack pages onto the end of it temporarily in /new_folders
Cheers Lisa
Lisa, hi! I actually figured out just that over the weekend. Works great. But thanks so much for jumping in and validating. (Occasionally, I get a clue!)