How do you preview your web projects to clients?
Up until this point in my career, I have usually modified my HOSTS file as the need to test a website before its DNS propagation or website launch occurred.  This has worked well on in-house projects, but I'm finding the approach completely impractical when it comes to previewing my clients' websites to them before the sites go live.

The solutions that I use at the moment are as follows:

  - For strictly XHTML/CSS/Javascript projects, I simply set up a demo location, as the base URL of the website is not a big deal.
  - For WordPress/Wiki projects, I often find myself developing themes locally via WampServer, and then essentially having to recreate all of the database/site options all over again.  This is why I use HOSTS files on my own projects, as I can dump all of the contents of my development database to my live database and the website is good to go.

So my question is about the best way of previewing a website to a client and/or switching from a development to a live state as quickly as possible.  I do not want to have to retread over my steps two times (dev. phase and live site phase), but I also refuse to work on live versions of websites for the obvious reasons (I could accidentally the entire site).

Cheers,<br />
Philip
How do you preview your web projects to clients?
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Up until this point in my career, I have usually modified my HOSTS file as the need to test a website before its DNS propagation or website launch occurred.  This has worked well on in-house projects, but I'm finding the approach completely impractical when it comes to previewing my clients' websites to them before the sites go live.

The solutions that I use at the moment are as follows:

  - For strictly XHTML/CSS/Javascript projects, I simply set up a demo location, as the base URL of the website is not a big deal.
  - For WordPress/Wiki projects, I often find myself developing themes locally via WampServer, and then essentially having to recreate all of the database/site options all over again.  This is why I use HOSTS files on my own projects, as I can dump all of the contents of my development database to my live database and the website is good to go.

So my question is about the best way of previewing a website to a client and/or switching from a development to a live state as quickly as possible.  I do not want to have to retread over my steps two times (dev. phase and live site phase), but I also refuse to work on live versions of websites for the obvious reasons (I could accidentally the entire site).

Cheers,<br />
Philip