Switch hosting platforms/operating systems

There are a number of reasons you might want to switch hosting platforms/operating systems, sometimes you want to utilise the more advanced features and modules of PHP that are not available on Window and so need to switch to Linux or your new website is developed in .NET and thus you need a Windows package instead.

Their is no automated way to switch between platforms due to the underlying technologies, as such a new account is required in order to manually transfer your domains and data. To minimise any downtime during migration follow the steps below to test you site before making it live:

Switching your hosting platform

1. Signup for a new account.
2. Make sure you make a backup of all web, database and email content.
3. Login and create a test third level domain (eg. add the domain ‘testdomain.pipeten.co.uk’).
4. Upload your website files using either using the built in WebShell File Manager or a FTP client such as filezilla.
5. Upload any database required for the website. See here for steps to upload a MySQL database, and here to upload a MSSQL database.
6. Test your website is working correctly using the third level domain created in step #1.
7. Once ready to go live, remove your domain from the old account and add it to the new account using Domain settings > Add new domain > Host existing domain.
8. Login to Webshell or your FTP client again and rename the automatically created directory ‘yourdomain.com’ to ‘oldyourdomain.com’.
9. Still within Webshell or FTP, rename the directory ‘testdomain.pipeten.co.uk’ to your ‘yourdomain.com’.
10. Finally you will also need to recreate any mailboxes needed for ‘yourdomain.com’.
11. If moving multiple domains, simply repeat the steps above (to use the same third level domain just recreate the third level domain folder e.g. ‘testdomain.pipeten.co.uk’).
12. When you are happy that all domains are transferred across and everything has been setup correctly, you can request to close your old account.

These instructions for transferring a domain are only relevant if your domain is pointing at our nameservers and when transferring between two UK accounts. The transfer process will also differ slightly if you are using a dedicated IP address and/or SSL certificates.

For more information and any other questions on switching platforms please contact the support team using the usual methods.

Classification: Public
Last saved: 2021/05/19 at 15:46 by Jamie