I got a call today from someone who builds sites with Joomla that wasn't sure what the best way to move sites between servers was, and in fact was inquiring about getting designguru to sub-contract the work.... this kind of shocked me at first because its quite a simple process.

Then again, over the years I've become somewhat familiar to shell/unix command prompt plus using ftp and phpmyadmin - all things that may seem daunting to a newbie, so I thought to type up a post with some suggestions for all of you.

Ultimately, a Joomla site is made up of a database and a bunch of files (the core Joomla install + any extensions your specific site has been setup with + extra images etc...) 

1. The standard-issue solution: For years I've been either downloading the entire root file structure using an ftp client, or shell access to my server, and then jumping into phpmyadmin to 'export' my database to an sql file which I download on my local system.

The advantage of using shell is that you can first create a tidy zip file of your site before downloading it - sometimes files tend to go missing otherwise via ftp when your connection times-out etc...

Okay, so at this point, you've got local versions of your database and files, now you need to throw them onto the new server setup... *before you do* make sure that the version of sql is the same - there could be funkiness otherwise. To upload the sql file, get into phpmyadmin on the new server and open a database (or create one if needed), you'll want to make sure that the collation is the same as previous to avoid characters turning out as &^%$# type strings... then click on the 'import' tab, choose your locally saved sql file and click 'go.'  That's it - your db should be securely installed on the new setup.

I recommend uploading the zip you created in shell, then using shell access to unzip it on the new server.  If you don't have shell access, ftp the files up to the new server and repeat the directory path as before - ie.  put everything in the root or directory of the domain as before (eg. http://www.domain.com or http://www.domain.com/site).

You'll need to edit the configuration.php file in your root directory to reflect the new server's absolute path as well as the database location (if its not 'localhost' - check with your host company), plus database name and login info - if you set it up differently from before.

Voila, you've moved your site!

2. The 'Easier' Way: Extensions:  If you're a bit too shy or time-pressed to do everything I've just mentioned, you can venture over to J!ED and check out the extensions which are available to do this job for you... well, at least parts of the job.

I haven't tried these but a couple worthy of mention when I glanced over the options this afternoon are: Joomla Cloner (commercial), JoomlaPack (Open Source).  JoomlaPack looks particularily delicious because it has measures to ensure file integrity as well as a component structure to enable you to simply re-instate your site within an existing Joomla install.

Has anyone used an extension to handle this task? What have your experiences been? 

Comments (6) >>

I may try Joomlpack
written by chris, August 16, 2007

I recently moved hosts and the new one doesnt have tools to backup website. Think I will try Joomlapack - anyone tried it ?

JoomlaPack
written by Davide Marquês, August 22, 2007

I normally used JoomlaPack to deploy my sites when they're production ready. The component packs your entire site into a zip file, re-creating the installation directory. It works great! It rocks!

But what about extensions?
written by pierre, August 28, 2007

Transfering a site from one server to another has been simple for me, but where I have run into problems is with extensions. What is the proper procedure for moving a site that uses several extensions? It seems like some are friendly to move and others aren't. I tried this for a site the other day, but ended up with a blank white page.. 1.Backup database 2.download entire site content 3.move data to new server 4.restore sql broken site so then I tried installing fresh install of joomla, installing all of the same extensions, and then restoring the sql database and got the same thing... a blank white page. ????

Transfeing Joomla Sites
written by Naveen Kapur, October 04, 2007

Amazing to find Joomla ghost component. Never seen such a easy job done by Joomla Ghost. Easy to install Easy to use Recently I transfered a site with nothing less than 1120 Pages with more than 12 extensions pre-installed. Guess what, it took only 10 mins to do the entire job. I guess, this component is the perfect solution.

Transferring Joomla files to another server
written by Carole Galassi, January 15, 2008

Just wanted to express a word of thanks for your article above. After searching through many websites, this one was the most well written, most comprehensive article I've read on transferring Joomla files from one server to another. I was able to transfer my site successfully without any problems.

Reinstall Backup
written by Luke, March 10, 2008

I have just finished my website which i am hosting on my own web sever. I really don’t want to lose all the work i have done so any ideas on how i can back up my site??
I tried JoomlaPack which backed up my site but I couldn’t work out how to reinstall the backup!!
Any help please

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