maintaining configuration differences between dev and live environments during deployment from SVN

Question

We use the ExpressionEngine CMS (php) to create websites. For each site, we set up a subversion repository and commit the EE installation as well as any custom templates, images

Answer 1

A lot of the configuration options could be dealt with by switching on $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'].

For example

switch ($_SERVER['HTTP_HOST']) {
    case 'developement.domain.com':
        $api_key = "dev environment api key";
        break;
    default:
        $api_key = "live environment api key";
}

Then for .htaccess issues you can set an alternate .htaccess file in your vhost definition using the AccessFileName directive:

    ServerName sitename
    AccessFileName .htaccess-dev