Viewing website at an IP address or otherwise

[h34v3ns3nt]

Hello

I am previously familiar with cPanel WHM (Web Host Manager) and new to Plesk, and I just require a little guidance.

In the past, under WHM I would first create a user account (specifiying the domain) supply necessary credentials and tailor the account usage depending on client requirements (disk space, bandwidth, X no of MySQL databases etc).

Then, for our client use, and to make things tidier, I could set up an A record on our domain’s DNS e.g ‘clientdomain.ourcompanydomain.co.uk’ to point to the new account for testing purposes, though this wasn’t entirely necessary as the account and webspace could also be accessed from a fixed IP address, suffixed with the account username e.g. 195.238.172.35/~accountalias.

In a nutshell, this created a virtual host on the VPS to which an A record could be bound to.

In the example below I will be transferring a domain and MySQL database to a new hosting company which runs Plesk.

Where I am up to at the moment on the Plesk platform is;
I have created the webspace ‘clientdomain.co.uk’ (However, I couldn’t see where to limit resources for each webspace??)
Created a new MySQL database on Plesk and migrated the old database to the new database.
Setup the FTP access under a dedicated IP ‘XX.XXX.XX.XX’ as well as SHELL access.
Migrated all the web files from the previous hosting to the new hosting.

These steps all seem straightforward enough.

Now, I am wanting to test the site to ensure it is running correctly from the new hosting. How would one go about this?

There is a globe icon to the right of the webspace name I can click to view the site.
This pops up a window containing the site....but....the URL in the address bar is the domain of the live site. This obviously isnt enough proof the site is operating from new hosting. For all I know this could just be popping up a window and populating it with the ACTUAL live public domain version of the site.
No, I would need to be able to see the site at an IP address.

This is where the confusion is. If I have multiple sites all running from the same IP (assuming this is possible on Plesk) how would one view each account separately similar to my previous understanding through cPanel WHM.

Once I am comfortable that the preview is being displayed from the new Plesk hosting I can then update my local machines host file with the live domain to ensure URL dependancies are being met and to ensure all links are working. Once im happy with that, I can have our client update his DNS records to point to the new hosting.

I hope this makes sense.
Thanks

 

[Jay Versluis]

Hi there,

yes it is possible to preview a website on a "dummy domain" in Plesk before you change the DNS records. I know the feature exists, but I can't tell you how reliable it is. It's worth a try though: head over to Tools and Settings - under General you'll find the Website Preview Settings. You get three options here, one of which will let you specify a domain that resolves to your Plesk machine and use that as the "dummy domain".

Next in the actual subscription you click on the "eye" icon and this should take you to the "dummy domain".

In regards to your other question, you can limit resources per webspace with the help of a Service Plan: when you create a subscription, you'll have to select a Service Plan - this is a template which defines how much webspace the subscription gets, what hosting parameters it uses, which apps it can install, etc. Plesk comes with a few pre-defined sample plans - feel free to change / amend / delete those.

Service plans also make it easy to change several subscriptions at the same time: say you wanted to change every subscription's PHP settings from Apache to FastCGI you just make the change in your Service Plan, then sync all Subscriptions based on said Service Plan and Plesk does the rest.

Hope this helps ;-)

 

[DaveKay]

The Website Preview Settings work reliably. I use it during website development process with clients.

It's exactly what h34v3ns3nt is looking for.