Developing alongside existing site?

[Will Stamper]

Hey guys, I have a pre-existing Wordpress site and plan to make the move to IPS.

So far, I've installed IPS with a new database into a domain subdirectory (mydomain.com/IPS) to start tooling with it.  I've dug around for a bit, but I can't seem to find the best way to do this.

1. Am I to assume the database holds many of my changes, and I can simply move the contents of /IPS into my root directory (obviously changing a few URLs in ACP) when I'm ready to launch?
2. Should I have used the Wordpress database (for migration ease)?
3. Should I have immediately migrated (disabling Wordpress signup, etc. until IPS launch)?

I'd like to figure this out before I waste a lot of development time on something I won't be able to use.

I guess the better question is, how would YOU do this?  Perhaps this has been documented and I'm really bad at wording my searches.  Either way, any help or links would be greatly appreciated!

[Bluto]

Did you check out this doc?

http://www.invisionpower.com/support/guides/_/importing-and-conversion/convert-to-ips-community-suite-r37

and

http://www.invisionpower.com/convert

[Will Stamper]

Interesting, I dunno how that flew under my radar so hard, I dug around forever!  Thanks for the tip.

[Bluto]

Good luck with everything!

[craigf136]

Easiest way is to get content setup in IPS and when ready, put wordpress site offline for maintenance and then convert to IPS, not sure if you have a forum system installed alreasdy. Check conversion has went well and then change the urls in config_global.php and under system settings for upload directories.

We are here to help if required, good luck with conversion.