Step 1:

Your test site is moved to the new test environment and a preview / future production location is set up on the new production environment. This allows you to check functionality of the future production site before the DNS migration occurs.

NOTE: For more accurate testing and checking of functionality with your applications (for example Shibboleth, WordPress, etc.) we will instruct you on how to update your local hosts file.  This will allow you to point your production domain to the new IP on the new server so that you can interact and test with the site as though it has migrated to the new servers.

Step 2:

Once you've verified that the preview / future production site is ready to serve as the new production site, we'll coordinate recopies of the content and DNS changes to complete the migration.

Note:

• Production DNS changes are generally scheduled at least 24 hours in advance to occur on a business day M-F between 7AM or 4PM.
  
• The time-to-live (TTL) on the DNS records is lowered to five minutes in advance.  This enables the changes to propagate quickly and reversed in a matter of minutes if there are any unforeseen problems.
• If you are interested in transferring your site to Web Hosting, see Web Hosting - Transferring My Existing Domain.
• For information about maintenance mode options, see Web Hosting - Maintenance Mode for Migrations.