I just installed WordPress. I have a non WordPress splash page at [root folder]/index.html. I’d like to keep the splash page up while I work on skinning WordPress. When I try to access index.php (also in the root folder), it rewrites the url to index.html. I don’t see index.html in the url but the splash page is there and I never see WordPress.
I am able to access the WordPress admin without issue. Anyone know how I can access WordPress without making it go live?
Either use a plugin (like wp-maintenance-mode) or hardcode your .htaccess file to redirect to the splash page, and allow your own (or your team) IP address to ignore the redirect. Like this:
<IfModule mod_rewrite.c>
RewriteEngine on
RewriteCond %{REMOTE_ADDR} !^127\.0\.0\.1
RewriteCond %{REQUEST_URI} !/splashpage.html$ [NC]
RewriteRule .* /maintenance.html [R=302,L]
</IfModule>
Regarding your doubt why index.html gets served from root, it is because it usually takes precedence over index.php. If you wanted to change that, you would have to change the DirectoryIndex.
EDIT: I thought it was obvious, but, for the sake of clarity: 127.0.0.Best Answerhould be changed to your public IP address. Also note that 302 is Temporary Redirect, which is what we want.