Update and promote

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Every publish is two actions. Update builds; Promote publishes. They are separate so that you always get to look at the site before the public does.

This is also why a Confluence edit never reaches the live site on its own.

#Update

Builds the whole site and uploads it to a private staging preview. You can follow it on the site's Overview as it moves through Queued, Preparing, Processing N of M pages, Finalizing and Complete.

Site Overview while an update runs, showing Processing 0 of 17 pages, the Preparing, Processing and Finalizing stages and a Cancel link
While Update runs, the Overview shows the stage it has reached and how many pages are done. Cancel stops it part way.

  • The preview address includes a random code that changes with every deploy, so old preview links stop working.

  • The preview always blocks search engines (its robots.txt disallows everything), so a preview never turns up in search results.

  • The preview is kept for 90 days. You'll see a warning once it has 14 days left.

  • Your live site is not touched.

Site Overview after an update, Complete with 17 pages processed, a Staging preview with a Promote button and Production not published yet
Once the build is complete, the Staging row holds your preview and a Promote button. Production stays exactly as it was until you promote.

#Promote

Copies the staging preview onto your live site. It asks you to confirm first, and names the live address it will publish to.

  • Anything on the live site that the new build does not contain is removed.

  • Sitemaps are updated to point at the live address, or at your custom domain if you have one.

  • The search engine block is lifted, so search engines can index your live site.

  • Cached copies of the old site are cleared, so visitors get the new version.

#Keeping track

The Overview panel tells you where you stand: "N pages changed since last deployment", a link to review the changed pages, and either "Preview matches Confluence" or "Preview is N changes behind Confluence".

Once the site has been promoted, the small picture of your site at the top of the Overview opens the live site. Hover over it and it shows Visit site.

Site Overview with a Settings changed flag beside the Staging preview and a Promote button, and Production not published yet
Look for the Settings changed flag on the Staging row. It means the site settings have changed since this preview was built, so run Update before you promote.

#A few things worth knowing

  • An expired staging preview cannot be promoted. Run Update to build a fresh one.

  • You can deploy up to 12 times an hour per site, with a further cap of 12 across all your sites. Exports count towards these limits too.

  • Only one deploy can run per site at a time.

  • Access changes are the exception to all of this. They apply to staging and the live site straight away, without an Update or Promote.

Update builds. Promote publishes. Neither happens by itself.