My laptop has a similar setup of web server, languages, shell, etc. to both my hosting servers. My development desktop is almost exactly like my hosting servers, except it also has all my development tools and X on it (and PySol and Gweled, and even more browsers than my laptop). Then I have a testing server here in my office that I don't develop on and just test. I can completely wipe it and configure it exactly like my hosting servers or a client's third-party or in-house server.

Nothing but simple text changes go live on a client's site until it works on at least two other systems. I find tar, gzip, and scp are very helpful tool for getting the files exactly where I need them. I suggest just biting the bullet and having multiple systems.

YMMV, but I find that having clients call me and complain about lost business is a lot more hassle than an extra round of tests.

You can always, so long as you're working with allowing and denying IP ranges, deny anything outside your needed ranges for the actual, in-place directory until you're ready to launch it publicly. You could also use URL rewriting or redirection possibly also keyed to the visitor's IP.

Update: fixed a typo

In reply to Re: advice sought on perl web dev setup by mr_mischief
in thread advice sought on perl web dev setup by punkish

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