[Sigia-l] handling transitions to new site architectures?

[Eric Scheid]

Imagine the client has an existing website, imagine a completely new site
has been built using (or not) all the best practices, wisdoms, and
buzzwords, and the scheduled launch day is approaching. Imagine that the
arguments against a big-bang launch have been made and have failed.

I'm looking for articles, books, or other wisdom which address the situation
of handling the transition from one site architecture to a new one. What
actions can be taken to smooth the switch over to the new site? Things I've
thought of include:

*   set up redirects for the top popular URLs of the old site
    to appropriate pages on the new site. use the magic of
    power-laws to zero in on the top pages

*   insert a "new site is coming" page in the old site,
    complete with a "contact us" form

*   consider shifting the old site to http://www-old.domain.tld/
    on the day, just in case something got missed in the transfer,
    just to help out the really desperate

*   make sure your 404 page actually says something useful

*   consider making a sister page to the "site map" page which
    discusses any major re-orgs, and where to find old stuff
    on the new site

*   do some web server black magic to force expiry of proxy caches
    of the old site content

*   identify which search engines send you significant referrals,
    and research how to get them to refresh their databases

*   do a test deployment late at night, and then switch it back
    who knows what weird config problem may be lurking

*   if the website is to be hosted on a new server with a different
    IP address, get the DNS jocks to drop the TTL and expiry for the
    domain name, and don't increase them until the new site has had
    time to reveal any catastrophic problems

*   stock up on canned beans, booze, and ammunition.

e.