Title: Developing WordPress site offline
Last modified: June 12, 2017

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# Developing WordPress site offline

 *  [emmalj1993](https://wordpress.org/support/users/emmalj1993/)
 * (@emmalj1993)
 * [9 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/developing-wordpress-site-offline/)
 * I am not a fan of editing WordPress sites within WordPress, so much prefer to
   work offline, in the same way that you would if you were creating a static HTML
   website. I have downloaded my WP files to my localhost using MAMP and FileZilla,
   so can now edit the code in Sublime Text.
 * However, when I go to view the website on localhost, the following text is displayed
   instead of my website:
 * “<?php
    /** * Front to the WordPress application. This file doesn’t do anything,
   but loads * wp-blog-header.php which does and tells WordPress to load the theme.**
   [@package](https://wordpress.org/support/users/package/) WordPress */
 * /**
    * Tells WordPress to load the WordPress theme and output it. * * [@var](https://wordpress.org/support/users/var/)
   bool */ define(‘WP_USE_THEMES’, true);
 * /** Loads the WordPress Environment and Template */
    require( dirname( __FILE__).‘/
   wp-blog-header.php’ );”
 * How can I view my website? I want to get to the stage where I can edit in Sublime
   Text and check to see what it looks like on localhost. Eventually, I plan on 
   re-uploading the file back to WordPress.
 * Any help would be much appreciated.
 * Emma

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)

 *  [Airster](https://wordpress.org/support/users/airster/)
 * (@airster)
 * [9 years ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/developing-wordpress-site-offline/#post-9219090)
 * Hi Emma,
 * The way I would do what you want is to setup a fresh WP install on my local machine,
   and then use the Duplicator plugin ([https://en-gb.wordpress.org/plugins/duplicator/](https://en-gb.wordpress.org/plugins/duplicator/))
   to copy your live site to your local site.
 * You can then reverse the process to put your local site live.
 * Note: this is the a free way. There are plenty of paid for solutions out there
   if you are happy to pay.
 * I’m sure others here can suggest their own preferred ways though.
 * Good luck 🙂
 * Mark
 * P.S. It may seem a silly questions but do you actually have MAMP running when
   you trying to access your site locally. Your post seems to indicate that the 
   PHP is not being parsed.
 *  Moderator [bcworkz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/bcworkz/)
 * (@bcworkz)
 * [8 years, 12 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/developing-wordpress-site-offline/#post-9228833)
 * It appears at least Apache is running in MAMP or else a localhost request would
   not return anything, you would get a server not found error. This is assuming
   you used the http or https protocol with localhost. If you used the file protocol,
   it bypasses Apache and MAMP. But Mark is correct, PHP is not being parsed. PHP
   files are being treated like HTML files and PHP sections appear as plain text.
 * There’s something wrong with the Apache configuration. Apparently the PHP module
   is not being loaded with Apache. This is rather odd for xAMP installations, after
   all the ‘P’ in MAMP is for PHP. I’m not familiar with MAMP itself, but generally
   speaking for Apache, there should be a configuration file somewhere in the Apache
   folder structure that loads and starts the PHP module. It’s likely in the wrong
   folder or the settings are commented out.
 * Some installations have available and enabled folders that contain individual
   configuration files for each module. The one related to PHP should be in the 
   enabled folder. Other installations have PHP related settings like LoadFile, 
   LoadModule, SetHandler, etc. The settings that refer to PHP files should not 
   have a hash # at the start of the line. The hash indicates a comment, which is
   used to disable undesirable settings.
 * Once you make the corrections to load the PHP module, Apache needs to be restarted.

Viewing 2 replies - 1 through 2 (of 2 total)

The topic ‘Developing WordPress site offline’ is closed to new replies.

## Tags

 * [FileZilla](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/filezilla/)
 * [MAMP](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/mamp/)
 * [Offline](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/offline/)

 * In: [Developing with WordPress](https://wordpress.org/support/forum/wp-advanced/)
 * 2 replies
 * 3 participants
 * Last reply from: [bcworkz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/bcworkz/)
 * Last activity: [8 years, 12 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/developing-wordpress-site-offline/#post-9228833)
 * Status: not resolved

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