Cheat Sheets
One-page cheat sheets for the topics people ask about most — the quick primer and the few moves that matter, with links into the full documentation for everything else.
Sometimes you don't want a guided tour — you want the quick version: what the pieces are, the few moves you'll actually reach for, and a link to the full story for everything else. That's what a cheat sheet is here — a one-page, easy-to-follow primer, not a reference. The depth stays in the linked pages.
Two things to know about how they work:
- Cheat sheets serve every reader. The rest of these docs are organised by role — Using BOA, Self-Hosting, Operating, Developing — and each area is self-contained. Cheat sheets deliberately cut across all four: when a link leads outside the hosted-customer pages, it's labelled — for example (for operators) — so you always know whose documentation you're about to read.
- They're a map, not a mirror. A sheet gives you the basics and the most useful moves; the pages it links to carry the settings catalogues, the reasoning, the walkthroughs, and the edge cases. If a sheet and a linked page ever seem to disagree, follow the link — and tell us.
The sheets
- Caching — the four layers in 30 seconds, the
.dev.alias that gets caching out of your way while you debug, how to clear or restart things, and how to check it's all working. - INI control files — which of the two files to edit,
why the site file beats the platform file, how to apply and verify a change
on a
.dev.name, and why the PHP version lives somewhere else. - Sites & platforms — the pieces in 30 seconds, Clone versus Migrate Site, the safe upgrade path, renaming and aliases, and how to take a whole site with you.
- Shell & Drush — the two logins and three ways in,
drushversusvdrush, setting your own CLI PHP version, one-line site exports, and giving a developer their own login. - Backups & restore — what's protecting your site in 30 seconds, the one snapshot mode you can actually restore from, exporting your data in a line, and trimming retention to free quota.
- When something's wrong — the first things to try (they fix most problems), reading a failed task before you retry it, getting back into a locked-out site, and what's yours to fix versus your host's.
The list grows as new sheets are finished.
Caching — Cheat Sheet
The quick caching primer: the four layers in 30 seconds, the .dev. alias that turns caching off while you debug, how to clear or restart things, and how to check it's all working — with links to the full docs.
INI Control Files — Cheat Sheet
The quick 'which file do I edit' primer: the two INI files you create, why the site file beats the platform file, how to apply and verify a change on a .dev. name, and why the PHP version lives in a different file — with links to the full docs.
Sites & platforms — Cheat Sheet
The quick sites-and-platforms primer: the pieces in 30 seconds, Clone vs Migrate Site, the safe upgrade path, renaming and aliases, taking a whole site with you, and the settings people actually touch — with links to the full docs.
Shell & Drush — Cheat Sheet
The quick shell & Drush primer: the two logins and three ways in, `drush` versus `vdrush`, setting your own CLI PHP version, one-line site exports, and giving a developer their own login — with links to the full docs.
Backups & restore — Cheat Sheet
The quick backups primer: what's protecting your site in 30 seconds, the one snapshot mode you can actually restore from, exporting your data in a line, pulling an offsite copy back down, and trimming retention to free quota — with links to the full docs.
When something's wrong — Cheat Sheet
The quick triage primer: the first things to try (they fix most problems), reading a failed task before you retry, getting back into a locked-out site, and what's yours to fix versus your host's.