Development environment (Miva Mia?) and modules

[Capt'n Morgan]

I have a customer who wants to have a development environment for his store. My first idea was to purchase a second hosting account and mimic everything there. However I just found Miva Mia, which I guess allows you to setup a Miva enviroment on your PC. Has anyone used this?

My concern in either case is the modules. If we are using modules in the online store, do we have to buy a second copy of each to use either in Mia or on the second host, or is it possible to get around that?

Also, I just thought of this, does it make more sense to just add a second store inside of Miva (for use as the development store), or does that require an additional license?

[Bruce - PhosphorMedia]

Re: Development environment (Miva Mia?) and modules

To cover almost ALL cases of module licensing, simply use Miva Mia with the exact same content and modules, then use a HOST file on your PC (Search for HOSTS...no extension) to set the domain name to resolve to your local host ip. For example, add this simple line: 127.0.0.1 www.this-is-my-domain.com. Afterwards, when www.this-is-my-domain.com is entered into a browser, it will actually call 127.0.0.1 which, if Miva Mia is running, will open the local site. You can comment out the domain switch simply by add // in front of the 127.0.0.1 www.this-is-my-domain.com setting. Just be sure you close your browsers, and then re-open it before entering the url. (Add &mvt:s:remote_addr; to the title so you can always double check whether you are looking at the live or local site, it will show the IP address of the site.)

[Capt'n Morgan]

Re: Development environment (Miva Mia?) and modules

Thanks, Bruce.
So I will be able to install most moduels locally in this environment that Mia sets up.

Does anyone use Mia? It it pretty much a web server and miva engine, all in one?

[Bruce - PhosphorMedia]

Re: Development environment (Miva Mia?) and modules

i don't know of the numbers, but yes, its a common method of development and really the only way to do it locally (and efficiently) unless you want to setup an actual web server with empressa.

[Capt'n Morgan]

Re: Development environment (Miva Mia?) and modules

Might be a stupid question here, but Miva Mia is the web server and Miva Engine... where do I get Merchant to install locally, when I'm using a leased license from a host?

[Leanne]

Re: Development environment (Miva Mia?) and modules

You might find this helpful:

http://www.merchanthowto.com/tutsamples/mivamia.html