I'm trying to create a copy of an existing Magento website on my localhost for developing purposes.
I followed all the steps listed here: Copy ec2 files to local
I also created a fake domain for my localhost so that there’s a “.” in it as I read somewhere this is required by magento. So now my localhost fake URL is something like: www.mysite.local
I have XAMPP installed on OS X 10.9.1 and I placed the magento filesystem as follows: /Applications/XAMPP/xamppfiles/htdocs/magento/
In the database I added the local URL as follows:
update core_config_data
set value = ‘http://www.mysite.local/’
where config_id = 6;
and on local.xml I entered the following parameters:
<host><![CDATA[localhost]]></host>
<username><![CDATA[myusername]]></username>
<password><![CDATA[mypassword]]></password>
<dbname><![CDATA[mydatabase]]></dbname>
where localhost is just localhost, myusername is the username for the db I restored on my local XAMPP server, mypassword is the password for that same db, mydatabase is the name of the same db.
Still, when I browse to www.mysite.local/magento/ or www.mysite.local I don’t see anything appear.
What am I doing wrong?
Thank you so much!
If you're using a local server, here's some basic trouble shooting to help you debug:
Firstly, is the local server active? Can you visit http://localhost without it displaying server not found? If you can't, your local server is most not running. Try firing up xampp and launching Apache.
Secondly, it seems you're trying to create a virtual host for your local server. That's great! Virtual hosts allow you to create individual URLs for projects on the same server. E.g. http://myproject.dev. However, you first need to make sure that the server understands what you're doing.
You will need to create a virtual host in your server if you haven't already.
I see you're using xampp. What you need to do is navigate to your xampp install, and edit your apache/conf/extra/httpd-vhosts.conf file, which is the file xampp recommends you use solely for virtual hosts.
Reading: Setting Up Virtual Hosts for XAMPP
For example, in Apache, a hosts config file may look like this:
# Base
<VirtualHost *:80>
DocumentRoot "X:/"
ServerName localhost
</VirtualHost>
# Project - Some Project of Mine
<VirtualHost *:80>
DocumentRoot "X:/projects/myproject/public"
ServerName myproject.dev
ErrorLog X:/projects/myproject/logs/apache.error.log
CustomLog X:/projects/myproject/logs/apache.access.log common
php_value error_log X:/projects/myproject/logs/php.error.log
</VirtualHost>
(navigating to myproject.dev displays the files in my X:/projects/myproject/public directory)
This answer is not to explain virtual hosts to you however. There are plenty of amazing resources online to help you get started with setting up your own.
Don't forget to restart your server when you add a virtual host!
If this is already set up, is your computer's hosts file set up to point to your server?
Your hosts file on your computer is used to tell it to do certain actions when you enter a matching url in your browser.
Reading: The Hosts File and what it can do for you
Reading: How to Edit Your Hosts File
For example, using the apache conf file settings above, my hosts file must also include:
# My project - Localhost
127.0.0.1 myproject.dev
It tells my computer to send the request to my local server (at localhost) when I use the URL myproject.dev. The local server then picks up the request, sees that you're accessing myproject.dev and checks if it has any virtual hosts matching that name. Well, whaddya know, it does! It then looks at the DocumentRoot setting for the location of the server files, and continues the process. Think of your hosts file as a local DNS of sorts.
If you've just added the site to your hosts file, it may take a few minutes to start resolving correctly. Wait a little, clear your browser cache and try again.
Finally, if these steps are done, and you're receiving nothing, it may be a server configuration problem, or a .htaccess issue.
If you're running on windows, you can check your event log for apache server errors. If you have set up logging on the virtual host, you can check those files to see if it's picking up your requests, and what it's doing with them if it is.
Most issues after that point will at least yield a visible error in your browser (or a blank page).
I hope this helps!
Also checking the magento error logs could tell you what the issue is, assuming it's actually hitting magento at all at this point.
As Sean mentioned above, one of the most common problems I've seen when copying a magento site is accidentally omitting the .htaccess file - make sure it's present in your site root.
If you tested your site before making the change to core_config_data, then you can also try deleting everything in var/cache and var/session. Also make sure that the web user has write permissions on var.
Regards Hans