Testing your new template on a live website

Sooner or later it happens to all of us.
A live website needs to get a new template/layout but you do not want "the public" to see it yet.

This trick allows you to install your new template and make it visible only for you.

Connect to your webspace using FTP and open the root index.php with your favourite editor.

Find the line that show: $wb->get_page_details();

Just before that line insert the following code:

// Sticky Template switcher
if (isset($_GET['template'])) {
   if(file_exists(WB_PATH.'/templates/'.$_GET['template'].'/index.php')) {
      define('TEMPLATE',$_GET['template']);
      $_SESSION['TEMPLATE']=TEMPLATE;
    }
} else {   // else get the template to display from Session Variable
    if(isset($_SESSION['TEMPLATE']) AND $_SESSION['TEMPLATE'] != '')
        define('TEMPLATE',$_SESSION['TEMPLATE']);
}

And save the file to your webserver again.

Now you can request your website with a parameter ?template=[newtemplate_dir].
So if your template is located in the directory /templates/mynewtemplate/ use: ?template=mynewtemplate

From that moment on the website will be displayed in your new template (just for you!).

This article is tagged with:
Layout Tutorials Tricks Templates