Updating pages - how to close part of site during renovation

[palmpal]

Hello,

I need some advice on how to temporarily remove part of my website for a redesign. I've updated my robots.txt file so these pages are no longer crawled but I need to know the best way to handle the content pages. There are about 40 pages total that I would like to redesign. This section will likely take on a different format with different content, page names, links, etc. What is the best way to do this other than putting a message on each page that directs the visit to other parts of the website? Is there something I can do automatically?

Thanks!

[keyplyr]

I update pages on my local machine then upload to the server, overwriting the existing page. If this is something you cannot do, then why not just designate an online directory for this.

Example: Create a directory named /test. Then disallow that directory in the robots.txt. You can now edit away and see how everything looks/works without disallowing the individual pages. Then when done, just move them up to your root directory, overwriting the existing pages.

This will allow you to keep you site operational while you perform your updates.

[vkaryl]

This is basically what I do. I leave the "old" site resident and available until I get through tweaking the new stuff (which lives in a dated test directory, such as "062804newpages", until I'm happy with the functionality etc. at which point I download all the old stuff to a dated archive on my hdd, such as "063004oldsitepages", delete it off the server, and move the contents of the test directory to the main site directory.

[As an aside, NEVER EVER EVER simply delete the functional old site stuff without archiving it! BAD IDEA. No matter if some of it is on your drive already, believe me when I say that you will rue the day you don't have the complete fully functioning version of the old site in a usable archive.]

[[Signed: The Queen of Redundant Backups....]]