No matter what kind of site you're designing, it's imperative that you preview it online before you send out birth announcements.

You need to beta-test every site, no matter how large or how small. How you go about this depends on the Web posting food chain at your site.

In other words, if it's a personal site, take a look at it before all your friends tease you about spelling your own name wrong on your home page. If it's a corporate site, the stakes go up--you may lose clients (or your job) for taking big mistakes public.

To create a mini beta site:

1. Inside the public_html (or similar) directory on your site, create a directory called test or temp.
   
   
2. Treat the test directory as a mirror of the root directory, and re-create any subdirectories that are referenced by your new site, especially the images directory.
   
   
3. Post your new pages to the test directory.
   
   
4. Test the pages (see the next section, Previewing Beta Sites), and if you have a couple of pals who will be beta testers, e-mail them the beta URL.
   
   
5. When everything checks out, post the real site.

Tips

• So why not just post the real thing, right now, and then fix any mistakes you find? If it's one page, sure, go for it. But don't whine if you accidentally post the wrong, half-finished version of your home page on top of the original, which was in much better shape. Err on the side of caution.

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