SP Migration to New Server

[Peter Schober]

Brett Melling <brett.melling at exprodo.com> [2024-07-01 13:54 CEST]:
> The existing server (e.g. server1.ourdomain.com) has worked well for a
> number of years by way of a CNAME pointing to it - sp.ourdomain.com - that
> is referenced in our metadata, and we are ready to migrate Shibboleth
> functionality to new server server2.ourdomain.com which is configured and
> believed to be ready from testing of server2.ourdomain.com in isolation. 
> 
> Does anyone know of a reliable way of testing the Shibboleth functionality
> of server2 from a customer perspective before we update the DNS CNAME
> sp.ourdomain.com from server1 to server2, given the nature of DNS and how
> long it might take for a reversal to propagate again should there be any
> issues?

Simply add the new IP address for the existing, published host name to
your local PC's hosts file, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hosts_(file)
thereby overriding DNS for that machine.

Accessing the published host will then take you to the new instance
but only on the machine with the changed hosts file.

-peter