Transform Drupal 7 site into Static HTML version

What is a static HTML version

A static HTML version of your website is a snapshot of your website as seen by a random user at a certain point of time.
The content, navigation and theme of your site will be preserved, in HTML format and therefore since then immutable for the rest of the time.

Important: This action is irreversible, returning later on to Drupal will be extremely difficult.

Why might I need a static HTML version

You will be probably interested in a static HTML archive of your website if:

  • You don’t plan to change anymore the content of the site
  • The site had its purpose in the past (past events, projects, …) and nowadays is just kept as reference.

And

  • you want to simplify any future maintenance on the site

When not to move to static HTML version

  • You will continue modifying/creating information on the website
  • You might want to change the style of the site in the future
  • Your site depend on any server side action, examples: send e-mails, save webform information, dependency on the permission model, cron executions, view filters, …
  • You plan to add new functionality to the site in the future
  • If the site and its name have been successfully migrated to Drupal 8, and you are afraid some content might have been forgotten or incomplete during the migration.
    • In this case, just delete the Drupal 7 site; an offline archive is always kept within Webservices anyway

In those scenarios you would like better to check the migration to Drupal 8 or migrate your website to an alternative solution. More info: Drupal 7 End-of-life Actions

How is the procedure of transforming my Drupal 7 website into static HTML archive

The procedure is conducted through a Service Now ticket on the Drupal Infrastructure service.

Once the ticket arrives to our team the process will be as follow:

  1. Your site will be cloned to a temporary name, referenced in the future as TEMPORARY
  2. You will need to prepare this TEMPORARY site before we execute the transformation. Currently, preparation only includes granting the necessary permissions to the operation.
    • Fully public site: No action from your side. We will create a snapshot of your site as it’s viewed by anonymous users.
    • Fully/partially private site: In case some of the content on the website is protected and you need to have this content preserved, we will provide you an account name and we will expect that you grant to this account access to any of the protected content of the site that you want to preserve. We will then create the snapshot of your website as seen by this specific account.
  3. The execution of the HTML static archive of the TEMPORARY site will happen, either as an anonymous user or as a special account, as explained in the previous point.
  4. The static HTML archive of your website will be provided to you and you will be free to choose where you want to host it. From the central IT hosting options we suggest
    • Openshift (PaaS application) (for small sites)
    • EOS website (for big sites)
  5. Protect your site, two options here
    • Public site: No extra action required from your side
    • Fully/partially private site: You will need to configure the chosen final hosting option in order to protect the new static HTML archive
      • If you chose Openshift, Add “CERN SSO proxy” to your application and configure the e-group that should have access to the archive. Please note that no fine grain permissions are possible anymore
      • For EOS website option, please follow the intructions on https://webservices.web.cern.ch

Examples

  • Web 30 Anniversary event page: The site was created and was active for the Web30 anniversary event at CERN. Once the event finished it was kept as static HTML archive to maintain the access and future reference.
  • Electron Cloud Working Group website: Once a Drupal 7 site that was migrated to other technologies, MkDocs in this case. The user wanted to keep the old site as reference, so a static HTML version was created.
  • WLCG Public website: this case is a bit particular; the site was succesfully migrated to Drupal 8 but a static HTML copy of the site on its Drupal 7 look was kept for historical reasons.
  • WLCG website: similar case as the last one, site migrated to Drupal 8 but kept the Drupal 7 version of the site as reference.
  • Angels and Demons movie page: page created back in 2011 when the movie was released, kept just as history/reference since then.
3 Likes

If the site and its name have been successfully migrated to Drupal 8, and you are afraid some content might have been forgotten or incomplete during the migration.

  • In this case, just delete the Drupal 7 site; an offline archive is always kept within Webservices anyway

Hello, how would we access the archive in this case?

@jonixon in this case the archive we mention is kept on tape backups and is not readily accessible. You need to open a ticket with Drupal Infrastructure and justify your need. We will then manually recover an old backup of your site and serve it to you, a rather time consuming procedure for us, which is why we request sufficient justification.

1 Like

@kosamara Thanks for your reply. So this is really a last resort - I will in this case make my own arrangements to ensure everything is copied over.

1 Like

Can we still transform the Drupal 7 website to a static one?
Thanks
regards
Almudena

Dear Almudena,

You need to open a ticket to Drupal Infrastructure for that. I think there is still time before Drupal 7 is decommissioned.

Hi Sotirios

I hope you are Ok,…
Thanks for the information.

Regards
Almudena
Is there any possibility to postpone the deletion of the Drupal 7 websites?