Best way to setup a testing website/environment.

[bambo]

I am busy with a new website/project, together with some other persons.

I have my website online at the domain it will be released for testing. But I don't want to let others or bots access it, since the project needs to be kept secret until its finished. Only the ones who need to work on it should be able to access it.

How can I prevent strangers and bots to see this new website? Now I have forced login by htaccess @ root, and it seems to work very well I think. Is this a good way? Or are there better ways to setup a testing environment. (It needs to be online for the others who work with me from their house)

[phranque]

yes - http basic authentication is a typical way to keep out strangers.

[JS_Harris]

You can also run an sql database on your local machine and provide its IP to your employees so that they can work on files you've given permission to share. On their end it will act like a regular site. Search engines and everyone else can be kept out with auth checks.

Just mentioning this in case you don't want to spend money on a sandbox site just for testing. An added benefit is that you can shut down the site at will (by turning off the power).