Site Defenitions lost on upgrade to Dreamweaver CC 2017

[trickyweb]

On "upgrading" to Dreamweaver 2017 - all the existing sites are visible within the Files tab up to H. I can re-create the sites beginning I - Z from scratch -which is time consuming - has anyone had the same problem and found a way to recover the site definitions (all on localhost - running under a XAMP stack)? I have been told by Adobe support this is part of the "default workflow"

[Jon Fritz]

If you still have your old version of DW installed, you can...

1. Open the old DW
2. Got to Site > Manage Sites > Export to export all of your sites as .ste files
3. Close the old version and open the new

4. Go to Site > Manage Sites > Import to bring in the .ste files in

I'm guessing the tech support person you talked to has probably never opened DW.

[trickyweb]

Thanks Jon - I installed DW 2017 through the Creative Cloud Apps and it wiped 2015. So I guess I know the answer - recreate all the sites individually as Site > New SIte. Seriously unhappy with DW 2017 the 'live preview' through an iFrame broke the way I work through previewing on localhost and now I've lost 3/4 of my site definitions.

Think you're right on the support side - when I asked why the "default workflow" only applied to sites beginning from I - Z they hung up.

[Jon Fritz]

Yeah, I still don't understand why Adobe defaulted the installer to remove older versions, seems extremely silly when you can have them all installed at the same time without issue.

For future reference, when installing from the CC Desktop App, make sure to click the Advanced Options link on the bottom of the installation dialogue so you can un-check the box for "Remove Older Versions".

Live Preview didn't work well for me either before I moved back to CC2015. It would just randomly stop working when I clicked on it and only come back after restarting the program. There is a hidden "old style" Preview in Browser still in the program (who knows for how much longer) that can be accessed by either right-clicking the document window's named tab or the file name from the list in the Files window. You then choose Open in Browser from the list that appears and select a browser to preview without the "Live" functionality.

[moani84043]

Did a stupid thing.  Did a copy of my website files instead of export.  I'm new to Dreamweaver and having my own website.  Now I have a new laptop (old one is long gone) and I can't get my website to update with changes I've made.  The files do not show up on the remote server.  Help!  I'm using a PC with Windows 10 and Dreamweaver CC 2015.  Godaddy is my hosting company.

[Nancy OShea]

Go to Site > New Site and enter your FTP Log-in details from your web host. See screenshot.

Nancy

[moani84043]

Thank you Nancy.  I'm connected to the remote server but now when I try to upload my website creates a public_html inside the public_html and the second public_html can't find my images and document folders because those folders are in the first public_html folder.  I hope this makes sense.

[Nancy OShea]

You should not have more than 1 public_html folder.  If you do, your site won't work properly.

public_html is not a real folder.  It's a virtual folder used by your web host.

In your local files panel, you should NOT see public_html.  You will need to move your site files and assets out of that folder and into the site root which is C:/yourSiteName where C is your hard drive and yourSiteName is the local folder on your computer.

Nancy O.

[Jon Fritz]

Ah, you actually did "the other half" of what's needed when moving a site to a new computer.

Step 1 is to copy all of the files. An export out of DW is just for the settings, not the actual files.

All you should need to do now is...

1. Go to Site > New Site...

2. In the "Site" tab, give the site a name (whatever you want it to appear as in DW)

3. Set the Local Site Folder as that folder you copied over from the other computer
4. Click the Servers tab

5. hit the + icon

6. Give the server a name if you like
7. Set Connect using: as FTP
8. Enter all of the FTP info from GoDaddy (make sure to include the remote server's Root Directory (usually public_html but might be different verify with GD)
9. Test the connection

If it works, you should now be able to upload and overwrite the files that are already there.

If it doesn't, toggle the settings for Use Passive FTP and/or Use FTP Performance Optimization. One of them should work.

[moani84043]

Hi Jon.  I was able to get my site definitions rebuilt but now I'm having another problem.  My site can't find my images and my document folder.  It is creating a public_html inside of the public_html.  All my files are in the first public_html which I assume should be the only public_html.  So now my website has no images and all the links to documents are broken.

[Nancy OShea]

My Preferences were Synced to the Creative Cloud so my site definitions migrated over to 2017, no problem.   Edit > Preferences > Sync Settings.

Nancy O.

[trickyweb]

Thanks Nancy - Gave it a try - Gives me a message saying No Internet Connection (which is incorrect). As I don't think I had Enable Automatic Sync checked not sure this will make a difference even if it worked

[Nancy OShea]

Well, if you didn't Sync settings, there's nothing to sync with.  Sorry about that.

Sync Settings is a great time saver when migrating to new product versions.  So I do recommend using it once in a while.

Nancy O.

[trickyweb]

All very interesting but not sure it's relevant to the original thread - you may be better off in future moani84043 starting your own thread?

As a word of caution - think VERY carefully about moving from DW2015 to DW2017 - particularly if you are developing in Wordpress and/or PHP the new live preview is not for you. On a personal note it may be an idea for the Dreamweaver update to tell you it may lose all your site definitions and to back-up and ALWAYS keep the old version. This has been the most difficult update since I first started using DW back in the days of Ultradev Studio - well done Adobe.

[Jon Fritz]

I honestly would recommend against moving to CC2017 in the short term, especially if you work in javascript or json files a lot: Dreamweaver Help | Known issues | Dreamweaver CC 2017 at least until the first patch comes out.

[trickyweb]

Thanks Jon - just got to get back to 2015 now! I guess that's uninstall DW 2017 and hunt around the Adobe website for the DW 2015 set-up executable? Oh joy!

[moani84043]

I am so sorry trickyweb.  And I'll make sure I don't use DW 2017 either!  Thanks Jon and Nancy for solving part of my problem.  No further replies are needed.  I'll get out of trickywebs conversation.

[Jon Fritz · Accepted solution]

Installing older versions is simple and is done right from the CC Desktop App...

1. Open the CC Desktop App
2. Click the Apps tab
3. Scroll down to the FIND ADDITIONAL APPS header (not the PREVIOUS VERSIONS header, that's just the installed previous versions)
4. Click the blue link on the right of the FIND ADDITIONAL APPS bar
5. Choose the Previous Versions link from the bottom of the menu that appears
6. The FIND ADDITIONAL APPS header will now be populated with programs click DW's install icon
7. Choose the version you want to install (CS6, CC, CC2014 or CC 2015)

[trickyweb]

Jon you're a genius! Re-installed DW 2015 (like meeting a long lost friend!) and all the site defs came back with it.

Not sure where to go next with DW 2017 - in my brief skirmish I didn't come across anything that improved on 2015? Guess I'll wait 'till the CC Desktop App shows it needs updating and maybe give it another go,,,, now back to work!