Temporarily Close a Site for Maintenance

Hello everyone,

I have a quick question about something I have never encountered before, that I need help with. I thank anyone in advance for any assistance they can offer.

I think this is simple but...

I have a customer with a restaurant that asked if I could shut down their site temporarily while they finalize their menu changes. I guess they don't want a mismatch between hard copy and the website. They said they need about a week. I said to them "No problem" and then said to myself, "Oh crap, this is a problem" as I had never done this before. I'm assuming just from my bit of knowledge floating in my head, I could make a new home page that states the Temporary shut down for maintenance dialogue, but then is it a redirect? or what? That's where I'm lost. If you have a solution and it's not a bother, can you write step by step instructions as to what I need to do. I don't want someone to just state that "yes, add a redirect" and leave it at that, because I'm not sure I know how to do that properly, and don't want to bugger something up! I want to do this if possible, without changing or affecting the actual current homepage that I already have for the site. I created their site for them, so doing changes, adding a page etc, is not a problem. I'd like to be able to make a landing page, so when someone enters the url for the restaurant like usual, they come to a page that states the temporary maintenance shutdown but there's the restaurant phone and address, etc. So a custom page if you will.

I'm using Xara Designer Pro X

Thank you,

Tazz

Hi Tazz, this sort of interference with a site can cause problems besides those you mention yourself.

One of the biggest problems may be that of search engine ranking. Search engines can take some time parsing your site and ranking it. So removing content, even temporarily for a week, can drop your ranking and take time to re-rank after content is re-added.

As for a method of actually doing so in Xara, it would be to move the page content horizontally off the page and into the pasteboard area. Provided you have Web Options / Website / Clip to Pages Edges selected, nothing on the paste board is published with the site. You can then add temporary content to the page area saying "Under revision" plus contact details etc. Also remember you'll need to do this for all other pages on the site. So again perhaps a single page "menu" would better suit?

Then when the client gives you new content you can delete the temp content, move the old content back on page & amend as required. However bear in mind the SEO issues mentioned above. If your site ranks number one for "Shrimps in Peanut Butter" and you temporarily remove such content (i.e. to change the price) then reintroduce it after a week with an amended price, will the SE still rank it number one? It'd disappeared, how long will it take the SE to re-parse it?

Far better to explain this to your client, arrange a new menu launch date (online & in house) and do it on the same date.

Just my thoughts.

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Originally Posted by Egg Bramhill

Hi Tazz, this sort of interference with a site can cause problems besides those you mention yourself.

One of the biggest problems may be that of search engine ranking. Search engines can take some time parsing your site and ranking it. So removing content, even temporarily for a week, can drop your ranking and take time to re-rank after content is re-added.

As for a method of actually doing so in Xara, it would be to move the page content horizontally off the page and into the pasteboard area. Provided you have Web Options / Website / Clip to Pages Edges selected, nothing on the paste board is published with the site. You can then add temporary content to the page area saying "Under revision" plus contact details etc.

Then when the client gives you new content you can delete the temp content, move the old content back on page & amend as required. However bear in mind the SEO mentioned above. If your site ranks number one for "Shrimps in Peanut Butter" and you temporarily remove such content (i.e. to change the price) then reintroduce it after a week with an amended price, will the SE still rank it number one?

Far better to explain this to your client, arrange a new menu launch date (online & in house) and do it on te same date.

Just my thoughts.

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Egg,

Thank you for sharing your thoughts and expertise...all very great points you mention that I will definitely follow. I didn't even consider the SE implications that could occur. I will definitely speak to the client and come up with a plan B.

Tazz

I would publish a single page, index with the closed info. Then when you are back up republish the site.

Yes, but remember that SE's might also list your other pages Gary and if the client information is not up to date serve up outdated info...

Well I am not sure if there is any way to delete archived pages. But to people who go to the web address, they will see a sign down for maintenance.

Is'nt the simple solution to just simply change the menu page to read something like contact the restaurant for updated menu, or words to that effect. This way the site stays live without issues.

Yes but remember regular visitors will not be automatically be downloading the latest site, but one from their computers cache. So unless these visitors press Ctrl+F5 they still get the old version. At least that's my understanding ...

When I visit a regular site I don't press Ctrl+F5 each time. What would be the point in updating your site if all that everyone got was an old version? When I visit a regular site I get an updated version.

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Originally Posted by Miko

When I visit a regular site I don't press Ctrl+F5 each time. What would be the point in updating your site if all that everyone got was an old version? When I visit a regular site I get an updated version.

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The changed page can include an HTML META to force a refresh for everyone.

Acorn

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The changed page can include an HTML META to force a refresh for everyone.

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@ Acorn: Agree Acorn but how many Xara users know how & why to do this?

@ Miko:

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When I visit a regular site I get an updated version.

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No you don't necessarily, you would normally load a cached version of the site from your local computer from your previous visit. So unless you change the meta info as Acorn suggests the old site will be rendered.

So, yesterday I needed to add some information to my site. I opened Xara, I then added some information to one page. I saved the site to a local folder. I then uploaded just the changed page to my server. I then opened my web browser and went to my site. I then went to the page that I had updated and low and behold there was the updated page. I would suggest that the OP do just the same.

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Originally Posted by Miko

So, yesterday I needed to add some information to my site. I opened Xara, I then added some information to one page. I saved the site to a local folder. I then uploaded just the changed page to my server. I then opened my web browser and went to my site. I then went to the page that I had updated and low and behold there was the updated page. I would suggest that the OP do just the same.

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If you are making changing that you know will only affect the page HTM than yes that is possible. Add an image or change an NavBar or repeating object and you are sunk.

Acorn

Sorry for the interruption but Egg suggested "Shrimps in peanutbutter?" At first I was shocked, now I'm wondering. I gotta try it now.

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Originally Posted by Acorn

If you are making changing that you know will only affect the page HTM than yes that is possible. Add an image or change an NavBar or repeating object and you are sunk.

Acorn

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The updated page included a PDF file as a link. I also just put the PDF file into the index_htm_files folder without uploading the whole folder which I have done before. No issues experienced. I have another PDF file to add to another page which I shall do in the same way. I still can't believe that Joe Public would be expected to refresh a regularly visited website.

I used to update websites via FTP regularly. When the new files were uploaded, my browser ALWAYS showed the original site. Since it was a regularly visited site it was in my browser cache, and had to be manually refreshed before it updated. I've never consciously noticed a site automatically refresh. Although it does refresh after a time (logically), I ALWAYS had to manually refresh the page to see the latest version immediately.

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Originally Posted by Egg Bramhill

Yes but remember regular visitors will not be automatically be downloading the latest site, but one from their computers cache. So unless these visitors press Ctrl+F5 they still get the old version. At least that's my understanding ...

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But isn't this always a problem? I maintain a school website and if users don't load the latest version of say the school diary, and the old one is cached, they just see the old information. Trouble is that not many users even know how to refresh and work round the cache.

Philip

That's when .htaccess expire headers come into their own. Something like a diary needs a very short shelf life. So if the diary was a pdf file:

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ExpiresByType application/pdf "access plus 1 day"

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Or place the following on the page head placeholder as suggested by Acorn:

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<meta http-equiv="Cache-Control" content="no-cache, no-store, must-revalidate" />
<meta http-equiv="Pragma" content="no-cache" />
<meta http-equiv="Expires" content="0" />

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