Create a new development space from an existing production space
Overview
If you already have a space for content, your production space, a new development environment can easily and safely be created using Comala Publishing.
You can use Comala Publishing to
copy your current production space pages to a new space to use as a development or draft space and then
publish and sync the new development space pages to the original production space
The development space is then used to draft, edit, update, and check your page content.
Comala Publishing can be used to publish all the pages in one space (a source space) to another space (the target space) in the same Confluence site.
If you have any external links to your original space, These must be updated or redirected after completing the move. The published pages in the new production space have a different pageID as these are new pages.
Comala Publishing copies pages
blog posts and archived pages are not published
In addition, some page content is not published, such as
inline comments
page restrictions
Confluence page version and page history
Publishing and Confluence page history
The first time pages are published to a target space the target space page is set as Confluence version 1.
Comala Publishing publishes pages from a source space to a target space in the same Confluence site. The publishing action creates a new page version in the target space.
If page history is required, for example for audit, create a backup of the current production space/export a copy of the original production space before publishing pages from the new development space.
After the initial publishing of a page, each subsequent publishing action increments the published target space page version.
Prerequisites
Permissions
Before you can undertake publishing, you must
and action a whole space publishing action
View and edit permissions are required in the two spaces to publish pages from the source space to the target space.
A page in the source space with page-level permissions that do not include view permission for the space administrator is not published in a whole space publishing. The pages are effectively hidden from Comala Publishing and are not included in the space publishing report in the publishing dashboard.
New development space
Create a new Confluence space
this is your development (DEV) space for creating and editing your draft pages
Once the development (DEV) space is created you need to populate this new space with the content from your original production space - the (PROD) space - by following the steps below.
Copy the production space to the development space
The original production environment is temporarily configured as the source space for publishing.
In the original production (PROD) space, navigate to the Comala publishing dashboard by heading
Space Settings > App links > Comala Publishing
choose Configure Publishing
use the Target space dropdown menu to add your newly created development (DEV) space as the target space
choose Next
choose Publish the Source Space
choose Publish to confirm and action publishing the whole space
The screen displays a progress bar showing the publishing action.
The space publishing progress bar confirms completion.
The space publishing report for this publishing action is automatically displayed.
choose Back to return to the space settings publishing dashboard
Displayed in the Space Publishing section are
summary of the last space publish action
a See details link to view the report for this last space publish
You can also view a publishing report listing the publishing status for all the pages in the spaces.
Publishing report
In the Confluence sidebar
choose Apps>Comala Publishing
The default report displays the source space pages not currently synced. These could be pages out of sync or new pages awaiting publishing. The example space has no changes since the last whole space publish and displays no pages.
In the publishing status filter dropdown
choose Any state
The default report is for the pages in the [source] space - the current space and the original Production Space
all pages are synced
all pages synced by the user who undertook the space publish
Toggle the report to view the [target] space pages - the new Development Space.
all the pages are synced
Last updated by details
all are the same user - the user who published the space
When is the same date and time as the last sync date and time
all target space page Version set to v.1
The ProductionSpace pages are published and synced in the new Development Space.
Publishing status byline
Pages in each space are appended with the Synced publishing status lozenge.
source space - Production Space
target space - Development Space
Partial publishing
If not all the pages are successfully published, the space publishing report displays a Partially completed warning and the pages are listed in the report as Incomplete tasks.
These pages may need to be published using the single-page Publish option in the workflow popup on the page.
When successfully published and synced, the publishing status for the page is updated in the space publishing report.
The Processed pages; Published pages, and Success Rate values relate to the last whole space publish action and are only updated on the next publish space action.
Space homepage and publishing
Ensure an appropriate homepage is defined in the published space page hierarchy before publishing any content from the new development (DEV) space to the production (PROD) space.
Comala Publishing cannot publish the space home page (Overview page).
The homepage content is static in each space - you must manually add any content as the page is not published.
You can make the source space homepage and the target space homepage content dynamic by adding Confluence page macros such as
Page tree
Children
Content by label
insert excerpt
page include
Configure the macros to source page content from the current space.
After an initial space publishing action, changing a homepage (in either the source or target space) may result in pages being published to the root of the target space.
Set up the new development space
Comala Publishing is designed to publish content from a source space to an “empty” target space. Although a space with existing pages can be configured as a target space, if you set a target space that has some existing title pages that are the same as in the source space, this can cause publishing issues.
In this example, after copying your current production space to your new development space, you need to delete the content (except for the space homepage) in your existing production space before publishing from the new source development space.
In the development (DEV) space
navigate to the Comala publishing dashboard in the DEV space by heading to Space Settings > Manage pages > Publishing
add the original production (PROD) space as the target space
choose Publish space to copy the space pages to the production space
You need to first initiate a space publish operation before using the single-page publishing option.
Tips and troubleshooting
Refer to the Tips and tricks when creating a new development space page for further information on how Comala Publishing manages publishing
page URLs and contentIds
in-page hyperlinks
deleting pages after publishing