I’m including instructions below to set a hosts file on your computer. While this is a little complex, it is a completely foolproof way of testing your website and ensuring it works on our systems.

Basically setting a hosts file fools your computer into thinking that the website runs directly from our servers, even though it does not yet point to us. This only affects your PC and visitors to your website will see the site as normal in the old location.

To do this you need to edit a file on your computer:

The location of the file is as follows:

Windows PC c:/windows/system32/drivers/etc/hosts

Mac OSX /private/etc/hosts

Linux /etc/hosts

Just open it up in your favorite text editor (e.g. Notepad) and add the following line at the bottom:

[HOSTS FILE HERE]

On Windows you need to run Notepad with administrator permissions (right click -> run as administrator). On Mac the best way to edit it is using terminal and typing “sudo nano /etc/hosts”, then adding the line and pressing Ctrl+X.

Once you have made the change, save the file then restart your PC and browse to your website as normal. You will see it served from our systems and will be able to test the full functionality of your CMS.

To view the site on your existing host, just remove the line from your hosts file and restart.