web.uvic.ca service upgrade

We're upgrading our self-service web hosting services. This update will help us maintain the technical currency of UVic's web hosting service.

All web.uvic.ca sites will upgrade on Wednesday, August 7, 2024.

This technical change will impact any sites using PHP, Perl, or Python code. If your site doesn’t use any code, it will continue to work the same way after the upgrade.

If your site does use code, we’ve created a test environment and update instructions so you can check your current site. We recommend doing this before the server upgrade on August 7 to avoid any issues.

Don't need your site anymore?

If you don't need your web.uvic.ca site, there's an easy way to delete it.

Login to Online Services. Find Faculty and staff web hosting under your services. You should see an option to delete your web.uvic.ca site.

Prepare your site for web host updates

We recommend testing your code regularly to keep it updated. This will save you time whenever the web hosts are upgraded.

Check your site in the test environment

If you are using any PHP, Python, or Perl code in your website, you should test it in the new environment.

To do this, add port 8444 to your website address. Example: https://web.uvic.ca:8444/~NetLinkID

If everything works at this new URL, you don’t need to make any changes. Your website will continue to work after the upgrade.

If your code doesn’t work, you’ll need to update your code.

Update your code

To update your code for the new environment, start by copying all your content from the “www” folder into the “www-dev” folder.

Then access your site using the 8443 port number (e.g. https://web.uvic.ca:8443/~NetLinkID). This port number directs your “www-dev” folder to the updated test environment.

Now you can update your code in the “www-dev” folder so that it works in this new environment.

WARNING! By default, there are no protections added to prevent other users from accessing dev URLs. We recommend adding user authentication to your “www-dev” folder to limit who can see it.

• Restrict access to your website - Windows
• Restrict access to your website - macOS

When you are done updating your code, your site will be ready for the scheduled upgrade on August 7th.

Due to the nature of the web host upgrades, you can’t move your updated code into your “www” folder until after the August 7 update.

Move to production

Once the web host server upgrades are completed, you can move your updated code into production.

To do this, copy your updated code from the “www-dev” folder back to the “www” folder.

Your website should be working as intended.

Questions?

If you have any questions or concerns about the web host upgrade, please contact the Computer Help Desk.