Question

I am an avid webdev hobbyist and freelance, up until now I simply edit the website live (put a maintenance message up while its being made), now all my projects up until now have also been very small.

eg I make a site, show em, take money and go, I’ve never had to work on a site after it’s gone live.

Now my new project is pretty big and I know I will have to edit it after its gone live and maybe have a small team of devs (atm just me)

So how do people professionally handle this? I know I will need a prefix-amp app cos i run an apache server, I’ve also heared that people use github for versioning, but I’m not really sure because apparently its not svn?

Thanks

ps. I have a windows 7 pc, so no mac apps please

Answer 1

up until now i simply edit the website live

Terrible in my book 😉

so how do people professionally handle this?

First you need to setup a development server (it would be best to keep it as close as possible to the expected live environments). On this server you would install all the software you need.

You may also want to setup a staging server.

i know i will need a prefix-amp app

I hope you are not talking about those one click installers. If you would do it professionally you should install everything yourself that way you can set it up the way you need it.

ive also heared that people use github for versioning, but im not really sure because apparently its not svn?

GitHub is just a website. What you are looking for is git or svn for versioning. You could also setup a git or svn server locally instead of using services like GitHub. Basically what versioning is is that when somebody makes a change to the code he/she would need commit the changes. This way it is easy to keep track of changes in the codebase (like what was changed, when was it changed and by whom).